48 
cotton. But be complained that his plants were diseased and only 
yielded a little cotton. In fact, the bushes with their dead and fallen 
leaves presented a very sorry appearance, and even the leaves that 
were still green were apparently attacked by a disease which showed 
itself in the form of very numerous small spots. I took a few leaves 
with me, believing it was a Sphmriacea or Sphseropsidea which had 
attacked the green parts of the plant. A few days later, when I arrived 
in Guayaquil, I examined the fungus microscopically, and was very 
much surprised when I found it to be a Uredo. On my return to 
Quito I stopped at Balsapamba to collect more of the fungus, but the 
disease had advanced so far that nearly all the leaves had fallen off 
and were destroyed. The rainy weather at the end of December and 
the beginning of January had apparently favored the growth of the 
fungus very much. 
1 will pass now to a more exact description of the fungus. As has 
been said, it affects all green parts of the plants. On the upper side of 
the leaves it produces small, purplish brown, roundish, or angular spots, 
either scattered or confluent in larger spots. The attacked leaves dry 
up and become brown. The sori are at first covered by the epidermis, 
and afterward break through on both sides of the leaf, especially on the 
underside. In structure the sori correspond perfectly to the Uredo of 
a Puccinia. The spores are not surrounded by a pseudo peridium, and 
are formed singly on pedicels. They are oval, ovate, or pear-shaped, 
with a thin, uniform, shiny, light yellow membrane and colorless con¬ 
tents. Their length is 24-30/* and their breadth 15-18/*; club-shaped 
paraphyses are present. The spores germinate in the ordinary manner. 
Whether this disease is limited to Ecuador or distributed elsewhere I 
can not now state. Cotton is now cultivated to a less extent than for¬ 
merly on the coast and perhaps Uredo gossypii is the cause. Dr. Rim- 
bach writes me from Cuenca that a cotton disease is known thereunder 
the name u Cancha.” The name is also given to the diseases of potato, 
rice, coffee, bananas, etc., so that without the diseased cotton plants 
for examination it is impossible to say what it represents. Description 
as follows: 
Uredo gossypii, n. s. —U. amphigeni. Maculis parvis purpureobrun- 
neis, sparsis vel confluentibus; sons prgecertim hypophyllis, flavescent- 
ibus; sporis ovoideis, ovalibus,vel pyriformibus; 24-30/* longis, 15-18/* 
latis, membraua sequali, pallide flavescenti, echinulata, contentu achroo; 
paraphysibus claviformibus immixtis. 
Hab. ad Balsapamba, Prov. de los Rios iEquatorise in foliis Gossypii 
sp., parasitica (Dec., 1890). 
A NEW DOASSANSIA ON COTTON. 
In a search to discover the teleutosporic form of Uredo gossypii I unex¬ 
pectedly found a Doassansia on the cotton leaves. As the fruiting 
bodies of this fungus are not visible to the naked eye, they escaped me 
