Notes on Sugar-cane Diseases. 
BY 
F. A. F. C. WENT, 
Professor of Botany in the University of Utrecht : formerly Director of the 
West fava Sugar Experiment Station. 
M 
With Plate XXVI. 
M ASSEE’S paper on Trichosphaeria Sacchari 1 induced 
me to make a renewed investigation of some of the 
parasites affecting the sugar-cane in the island of Java. I shall 
give the results of this investigation here, at the same time as 
those formerly arrived at, but which till now had only been 
published in the Dutch language 2 . Mr. Barber forwarded to 
me alcohol specimens of diseased sugar-cane from the West 
Indies, and his kindness enabled me to determine the identity 
of several of the West Indian parasites of the cane with those 
existing in Java. 
I shall begin first of all by describing two fungus-diseases, 
the red smut and the pineapple-disease. 
I. Red Smut ( Colletotrichum falcatum ). 
Red smut affects the interior of the stems of the sugar-cane. 
Externally no trace of its existence can be discovered, except 
when the canes are very badly attacked, in which case the 
1 Annals of Botany, Vol. vii. No. XXVIII, December, 1893. 
2 Went, Het Rood Snot; and Went, De Ananasziekte van het Suikerriet : 
Mededeelingen van het Proefstation West Java: both published in Archief voor 
de Javasuiker-industrie, I, 1893 ; also Bot. Centralbl., 59, 1894 : also J. H. Wakker, 
De Ananasziekte of het Zwart Rot in Oost-Java, Mededeelingen van het Proefstation 
Oost-Java, N. Serie, No. 7 ; Archief voor de Javasuiker-industrie, 1894, p. 209. 
[Annals of Botany, Vol. X. No. XL. December, 1896.] 
