May 23.1396. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
457 
not any advice to you. Take my moral for what it is worth, and 
draw your own conclusions. 
Other points there are I would fain have touched on, but 
must not further encroach on space. In conclusion, I ask your 
indulgence for any weak expression of those thoughts which have 
prompted this ; some, indeed, are too deep for w'ords. I can but 
hope some help has been afforded you to arrive at that stage of the 
journey where “ the high seal of character is set,” where the 
“Olympic prize” awaits you. If so, you can then stand a little 
aside from the hurry and crush of a restless world, seeing things as 
they are, not as they seem ; neither discouraged by petty vexations 
nor unduly elated by success. Wisdom shall guide you through 
the deeper waters you are entering on, whose “ ways are ways of 
pleasantness,” whose paths “are paths of peace.”— An Old Boy. 
BLACK STRIPE IN TOMATOES. 
The affected epecimen arrived in good condition for examination, 
and being a fall-sized fruiting example, with some of the fruit com¬ 
mencing to ripen, is characteristic of the Tomato plant as affected 
with the disease known as “ black stripe,” which corresponds with 
“the Tomato rot” of the United States pathologists, an excellent 
account of which may be found in the 1888 report of the United 
States Department o^" Agriculture, pages 339-346, by Mr. B. T. 
Galloway. The disease, however, was known in this country long before 
that, our first acquaintance with it being in the year 1873, when we 
had it very disastrously on some Tomato plants grown in pots in Peach 
houses, and still worse in 1875 on plants outdoors. 
The plant examined was perfectly normal at the roots. There was 
no trace of eelworm, but on the stem where the radicle issued 
from the seed there was a dark stain, and it extended upwards, 
being ultimately lost in the vascular tissues. Following the stem 
upward the dark stripe or long blotch appeared here and there, being 
most pronounced at the tie?, but beyond the discolouration of the 
tissue and the destruction of the epidermal cells there was nothing 
discernible. The hairs, however, were very abnormal and much 
contorted, the cellulose or cell wall appearing as fine threads, and 
mentioned, as they must not be confounded with the prostrate hyphae 
or filaments of fungi. 
Passing on to tbe leaves, each consisting of several leaflets, we came 
to the yellow stripes or blotches. On subjecting a section through this 
to microscopic examination we found the cells permeated by a streaming 
body, slightly darker in colour than the cell fluid, and easily detected 
by anyone conversant with cell structure and cell contents. This tissue 
ultimately becomes brown or black. The streaming is that of an 
amceboid-like body, but it is more that of the micro-organism. There 
is no hyphae recognisable in these cells, but I have no doubt the micro¬ 
organism is the plasma of a fungus, which may or may not at a 
subsequent stage develop hyph*, and from this erect filaments or out¬ 
growths, producing the characteiistic reproductive organs and seeds 
(spores). This is a new phase of fungus life, some may say, but it was 
noticed by the Rev. M. J. Berkeley in 1848, and it certainly is that of a 
myxomycetes growth, which indicates the evolution of fungi from the 
slime fungi, so-called, or myxomycetes. 
Examining the drooping tips of the young shoots we came across the 
same organism as discovered in Mr. Iggulden’s specimen a short time 
ago, and this is Plasmsdiophora tomati—the “ drooping disease ” of the 
Tomato plant, and known in the case of the Vine as “ brownure ” or 
“browning,” about which I have nothing “new” to relate, but the 
procedure given on page 360 will render a good account (to the 
cultivator) of this micro-organism, and possibly of that known as 
“ black stripe.” Indeed, it may ultimately be shown that tbe “ drooping 
disease ” is merely a s’age in the development of “ black stripe,” but the 
fact remains that “ brownure ” or “ browning ” cannot be transformed 
from a myxomycetes into a fungus. A myxomycetes can only produce 
a cell—a surrounding wall of cellulose to the contained protoplasm, 
which emerges as a zoospore ; while “ black stripe ” gives rise to hyphae 
within the tissues and to outgrowths from these, which produce 
conidia, and finally resting spores—the characteristics of a fungus. 
This indicates that the “ drooping disease ” as produced by Plasmadio- 
phora tomati is not the same as that wilting of the young growths 
.caused by the plasma of the •• black stripe fungus.” 
Passing on to the fruit we find the same plasma or body streaming 
through the cells. There is no hjpLae whatever, and the whole thing is 
extremely bewildering. But it is all made clear in the generalisation, 
namely, the disease began (in this case) at the root (Mr. Iggulden 
pointed that out soxe time ago), it passed up the stem, appearing here 
and there, then became manifest in the leaves and finally in the young 
growth, these wilting and perishing. The fate of the plant is thus 
practically sealed, but Nature is strongest in that of reproduction, and 
Ihe struggle for existence begins between the plant on the one hand and 
■the parasite on the other. The fruit, therefore, shows the " black 
stripe,” the tissue becomss discoloured down to that of the embryos of 
the future seed of the Tomato plant, and the fruit attains to a certain 
degree of perfection, but is of no va ue for useful purposes. The germs— 
so far as I have been able to ascertain these are confined to plasma—of the 
disease enter the Tomato seed and attach themselves to the testa or part 
corresponding or near to the P" trusion of the radicle on growth taking 
place in the seed. Thus the disease is carried over from year to year. 
and is in that re’pect hereditary. This characteristic of the “ black 
stripe ” has been pointed out by several Tomato growers in the Journal 
of Horticulture,'ieiQg confirmed by Mr. Iggulden and now by your 
correspondent, Mr. Arabia. 
Now I will ask your readers to go back with me to the Potato crops 
in this country before the outbreak (?) of the Potato disease in 1844. 
I can well iremember a disease my grandfather called "dry rot,” and 
what he told me of its disastrous effects on the Potato crops at the latter 
part of the last and beginning of the present century, and his description 
of “ dry rot ” exactly coincided with that I have endeavoured to give 
of “black stripe” in Tomatoes, the “stripe” being as clearly defined 
in the Potato apple as in the Tomato fruit. The Potato sets only pro¬ 
duced a weak haulm, and often collapsed before any tubers were formed 
but generally the “dry rot” was confined to a plant here and there 
which produced a few very small tubers, known in the Humber Valley, 
both in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire, as “ chats.” They were perfectly 
sound. The rest of the Potato crop attained the ordinary development 
of haulm, but sometimes the tops became brown at the tips, the leaves 
curled, turned brown, and then black, fell off. The tubers were smaller 
than usual in consequence, and some of them, usually the largest, had 
FIG-. 80.— PHLOX CANADENSIS. {See page 447.) 
reddish marks in them when cut. Such “sets” sprouted very weakly, 
sometimes produced no growth above ground after setting, or only grew 
a few inches high, the plant collapsing by the time it was usual to earth 
up the crop that had grown properly. The “sets” s mply rotted in 
the ground, and as it was early in the summer was called “dry rot” 
to distinguish it from “ wet rot,” which occurred about digging up or 
after they were placed in the ‘ pies.” I use the term prevalent in the 
Ouse (Yorkshire) Valley. 
The disease taking the tops of the Potatoes was the “ curl,” and it 
was carried over in the seed “sets” and in the “apple,” for we grew 
Potatoes from seed in those days. Then the “curl” died out as small 
sets were used. 
This malady does not materially affect tbe small tubers ; but it gets 
into the larger and is carried over from year to year, sometimes very 
little damage being done, and in others no perceptible mischief happens. 
But under certain conditions the disease does great injury, and being 
accompanied by the Potato fungus (Phytopthora infestans) is apt to be 
overlooked. American observers have long suspected this fungus as a 
cause of great loss to Potato growers in America, and it was put forward 
last year as a “new” di-ease. It is nothing more than tbe British 
“curl” fungus (Macrospnrium commune var. Solani), and the “black 
stripe” on Tonatoes is onlv that form of it called M. c. temati. 
As the outgrowths of the fungus are only prcduced at certain s' ages. 
