155 
for the entire immunity from smut observed in the infection experiments 
with barley, and especially because barley in the field is more frequently 
attacked by the dusty smut than oats. The results remained a com¬ 
plete enigma for three long years. But then this case also was ex¬ 
plained as naturally as imaginable. 
I received accidentally from Yokohama, through Chief Brigade Physi¬ 
cian, Dr. Kiigler, some smutty spikes of barley. It occurred to me that 
it was worth while to see whether the dusty smut on the barley in Japan 
agreed exactly with the dusty smut in Germany. I therefore sowed its 
spores, idiich in shape and size were indistinguishable from our own dusty 
smut, in nutrient solutions. Here it came to pass that in the universal 
germination of the smut spores into a promycelium no conidia were pro¬ 
duced upon the latter, although they appear in countless numbers, as we 
know, in the spore germination of our own dusty smut. The promycelium 
afterwards branched in thesame way, and just as abundantly, as any mold, 
but in a purely vegetative manner, without any formation of conidia. 
In this manner mycelial masses were produced of such dimensions 
as can scarcely be derived from Saprophytes upon slides. As soon as 
the nutrient solutions were exhausted the remotest threads grew out 
stolonlike, and spread to a great distance, just as I have described and 
figured it for several fungi in my cited book. The smut on the barley 
in Yokohama is therefore a fungus distinct from our dusty smut. Un¬ 
fortunately it was spring, and I had for comparison no smutty barley 
grown in our own fields. But in the following summer, as soon as the 
smut showed itself in the barley fields, I made cultures from its spores 
and found that they germinated just like those from Japan. I repeated 
the experiment with barley smut taken from as many places as possible 
in the vicinity of Munster in Wesen, but the spores always germinated 
without conidia. I communicated this observation to my distinguished 
friend and patron, Prof. Julius Kuhn, of Halle, and requested from him 
some spikes of wheat containing fresh smut. In these also was the 
same fungus as in the barley, the spores produced no conidia. Accord¬ 
ing to this the smut fungus on barley and ivheat is not the same as that on oats. 
In spite of the similar spore form a great difference between the two is 
shown in the germination of the spores in nutrient solutions. 
The negative results of barley infections, and the endeavor to give a 
natural explanation, led to a further positive result, the discovery of a 
new form of smut, which, in spite of its universal distribution, had re¬ 
mained unknown, and for the recognition of which it was first neces¬ 
sary to find out, by means of the artificial culture of smut fungi, a new 
method of diagnosis. I call the new fungus, which occurs on the Hor¬ 
dern, Ustilago liordei. The consonant behavior of the fungus from Japan 
and from Germany is evidence at once of its specific peculiarity and its 
value as a member of the genus Ustilago,* 
*A varying behavior during spore germination in water, sometimes with and again 
without conidia, was known long ago for the dusty smut, but owing to the rudimentary 
germination of the spores in water was not followed further. Moreover, seven years 
