y
the competition for food it encountered when integrated with the parent
mass, now becomes capable of spreading infinitely itself unless checked
by factors which deprive it of sustenance. These facts have been
repeated a hundred times in letters, telegrams and newspaper articles
since the project of attempting to blow up the inoculated batch was
known. In spite of warnings the authorities chose to go ahead. No, make
no mistake, this fiasco has not set _Cynodon dactylon_ back a
millimeter; rather it has advanced it tremendously."

There was silence while we absorbed this unpleasant bit of information.
Gootes was the first to regain his usual cockiness and he asked, "You
say fiasco, professor. O K--can you tell us just why it was a fiasco? I
know they stuck enough soup under it to blow the whole works and when it
went off it gave out with a good bang."

"Certainly. _Cynodon dactylon_ spreads in what may be called jumps. That
is, the stems are short and jointed. Those aboveground, the true stems,
are called stolons, and those below, from which the roots spread, are
rhizomes. Conceive if you will twoinch lengths of stiff wire--and this
plant is vulgarly called wiregrass in some regions just as it is called
devilgrass here--bent on either end at rightangles. Now take these bits
and weave them horizontally into a thick mass. Then add, vertically,
more of the wires, breaking the pattern occasionally and putting in more
in odd places, just to be sure there are no logical fracturepoints.
Cover this involved web--not forgetting it has three dimensions despite
my instructions treating it as a plane--with earth, eight, ten, or
twelve inches deep. Then try to blow it up with dynamite or
trinitrotoluene and see if you havent--in a much lesser
degree--duplicated and accounted for the situation in hand."

Everything now seemed unusually and, perhaps because of the contrast,
unreasonably quiet. Downstairs the radio, which had been monotonously
soothing a presumptive audience of unsatisfied housewives with languid
ballads, raised its pitch several tones as though for the first time it
had become interested in what it purveyed.

"... Yes, unseen friends, God is preparing His vengeance for wickedness
and sin, even as you are listening. You have been warned many times of
the wrath to come, but I say to you, the wrath is at hand. Even now God
is giving you a sign of His displeasure; a cloud no bigger than a man's
hand. But, O my unseen