198 Rhodora [Sbptbmbkb 



deeply 2-cleft attenuate paleas are obviously awn-tipped. This 

 plant, which may deserve specific reinstatement, but which seems to 

 pass directly into the other varieties, does not occur in the bleaker 

 habitats nor the more northern regions, like the headlands of New- 

 foundland and the coast of Labrador, where the others are found. 

 Geographically, it is decidedly more southern: known in Newfound- 

 land only along the sheltered river-banks; and on the mainland extend- 

 ing from Rimouski Co., Quebec, westward across the continent, south 

 very generally on ledgy shores or slopes through northern and western 

 New England and north-central New York, and locally to the Carolina 

 mountains. k 



Gray Herbarium. 



OX THE MENDELIAN INTERPRETATION OF OENOTHERA 



CROSSES. 



R. RuGGLES Gates. 



In a recent review of my book on Mutations, 1 East 2 takes occasion 

 to repeat certain criticisms of the Oenothera work which have been 

 reiterated in recent years with rather tiresome frequency. This criti- 

 cism is to the effect that since it is known that in the Oenotheras a 

 considerable percentage of the pollen grains, eggs and embryos fre- 

 quently fail to develop, therefore it is impossible to draw any con- 

 clusions whatever from the abundant crossing experiments that have 

 been made in this genus; unless, perchance the result happens (as it 

 occasionally does) to be Mendelian. In the case of East, we are 

 further assured that "no single fact discovered by those who have 

 made pedigree cultures of the group, precludes a Mendelian interpre- 

 tation." I venture to think that such a statement would only be 

 made by one who had allowed his bias to outrun bis discretion. It 

 would further, I think, scarcely have been made if its author had first 

 attempted to apply his idea to an explanation of the known facts. 



1 Gate*, H. Rufrylt'H, 1913. The Mutation Factor in Evolution, with particular reference to 

 Oenothera. London: MacMillan. pp. xiv + 353, figs. 114. 

 i Beat, E, M. 1918. RaxnxMu 17: 235-237. 



