205 
pean authors are considerably at variance and very brief in their ac- 
counts of its habits. It is said by different writers to occur on the 
green, ripe or fallen fruit. Observations here show it to occurat all 
stages of the fruit’s growth and decay. When the fruit is attacked 
before it is ripe, it usually remains hanging to the tree through the 
winter, even till fruit is ripe again, and spores of the fungus are to 
be found on it during the whole time. 
On May 8 a few spores from the dried remnant of a cherry, which 
had hung on the tree since the last fruiting time, were sown in water 
on a glass slide. They germinated within two hours by pushing out 
a vegetative thread from one end. This experiment was a number of 
times repeated, and the spores always grew with readiness. On May 
13 the inner surfaces of several cherry flowers were wet with a 
drop of water and spores from the same source placed on the moist 
spots. They were also sown on the moist surface of a leaf 
and covered with another leaf. The twigs bearing the flowers and 
leaves were put into water under a bell jar to keep them from wilt- 
ing. In twenty-four hours the spores had grown sufficiently to kill 
the tissues about them and turn them brown; in the case of the 
leaves the discoloration extended through the leaf and was equally 
conspicuous on the opposite side from the one on which the spores 
were sown. I could not satisfy myself to what extent or in what 
manner the fungus had penetrated the leaf, but it certainly found 
entrance, although it also formed abundant mycelium on the surface. 
Within a week the fungus had killed the flowers in which it was 
sown and passed down the pedicels, the extent of its progress being 
accurately marked by the death of the tissues. Dissection showed 
that the fungus threads were for the most part ; 
passing down the pedicel just beneath the outer 
wall or ‘‘skin,” as shown in fig. 6, and not 
accompanied by mycelium on the outer sur- 
face of the pedicels. The flowers and leaves 
on which spores were not sown were still as 
fresh as when gathered. The twigs were still 
left under the bell jar and after some days the 
fungus spread through the tissues of the cher- 
ry until every green part of it had been at- 
tacked and killed, and the surface covered 
with spores. 
Examining the trees, which hung very full 
of blossoms at this time, there was no difficulty 
in finding dead flowers. Dissection of the 
pedicels disclosed the same growth of mycel- 
lum as in those of the experiment. Placing 
these dead flowers under a moist bell jar they 
gave inside of forty-eight hours the usual co- 
pious development of spores. By this time 
the flowers on the two or three dozen very : 
large trees of the orchard had shed their petals; reais Old ina. tenes 
a careful examination and estimate showed the pedicel of a flower: 
that full five per cent had perished from the (.fiyeais of the fungus. 
attack of this fungus. “skin” or outer wall of 
By June 15 the cherries had reached full 5) dinmeters, Ognifed 



