PLANT DISEASES AND FUNGI.
23
potato disease, for instance, was first observed in Belgium in 1842,
and about the same time it was stated to have been observed in
Ireland, but the great outbreak was in 1844 and succeeding years.
It was known in Canada and some of the United States in 1844, in
St. Helena in the same year, and then first appeared in the Isle of
Thanet. In 1845, on the 16th of August, it was seen in the Isle of
Wight; on the 23rd of August in the south of England generally,
but up to the 30th was still unknown in the Midland Counties. By
the 7th September it had shown itself in Ireland, and later in the
year in Scotland.
The hollyhock disease was first made known from Chili, and
there it remained for many years, until the next place it visited was
the Australian Colonies, and there it seemed to rest for some years.
At length it was recognised in Europe, apparently beginning in the
south, and spreading rapidly. Finally the mallows on the coasts of
our island were attacked, almost simultaneously in the south and in
Norfolk, moving rapidly inland, until at length, and as suddenly as
a plague, covering the country and extending into Scotland. It was
hardly possible at one time to find any species of mallow, or any
individual of any species, which was not blotched and disfigured
with the pustules of Puccinia malvacearum, not a little resembling a
vegetable small-pox. The climax having been reached, and main-
tained for some time, a period of decadence commenced, and from
thence to the present its ravages have steadily diminished.
At one time it was quite common to speak of plant life and
animal life as different forms of life ; but in these latter days the
constant use of the term "Biology" indicates broader views, which
experience and investigation have supported, at least in the estab-
lishment of a close analogy between the phenomena of life as mani-
fested in animals and in plants.
Sir James Paget, in his address5 at the British Medical Associa-
tion in 1880, adduced some remarkable instances of the analogy
between the diseases of plants and animals : "I have long and
often felt," he says, "that we might gain help from studying the
consequences of injury and disease in the structures of plants"; and
again, "I have seen enough to make me more than ever sure that
human pathologists may find, in watching the consequences of
injuries and diseases of plants, facts of the highest interest in their
more proper study." It will only be necessary to quote one
5 "British Medical Journal," October 16th and 23rd, 1880.