84 
for "spontaneous hybridizing," it was rather a case of in-and-in 
breeding. The next year I cut the flowers open with a sharp pen- 
knife before their natural time, and applied pollen to some and not 
to others. The last did not seed, the former did— pollen being 
applied twice at an interval of two days. I was now sure that I had a 
fair cross. Unfortunately, before ripe, though in an unfrequented 
spot which I thought safe enough, something broke off the stalk, 
and that ended the year's experiment. The next year I went to 
work again. This time I called the attention of my w^orkmen to the 
plant as one that I wanted saved, and so felt safe. But, sure enough, 
one day I went over where the unlucky scythesman had been, and 
my flower stalk was cut down! This time it occured to me that if 
the stalk were planted deep in the ground it would still mature seeds; 
and it did, though not a large number. These were sown, and a 
few came up last year. To my intense annoyance, these plants were 
in some way destroyed. Feeling, however, that all the seeds could 
not have come up, and that some even from the same brood will re- 
main two years in the ground, I let the spot remain undisturbed, and 
this spring I had six plants come up, which have grown nicely all 
summer. Unless some accident occur to them, they will flower next 
year. It is because of my unlucky experience that I want to place 
on record the results so far as they have gone, lest some woeful ex- 
perience again cut off the story before it is completed. Well, the K 
Blattaria has, in the young state, dark green, smooth and shining 
leaves,_ and they are deeply sinuately lobed. The leaves of my plants 
are quite unlike these, nor are they quite entire, thick and wooly like 
those of the common mullein, but they are precisely like those of the 
wild plants of the same age and size of K Lychnitis. I pray, as only 
a botanist can pray, that my pets may be preserved till they flower, 
so that 1 may positively settle the question of the origin of V. Lychnitis. 
In the meantime, the following facts seem beyond dispute: 
Verbasaim Lychnitis in this part of the world has no particular 
tendency to spontaneous hybridizing with other species. " It seems to 
be a self.fertilizer. It is, we may sav, in great probability, a product 
originally of F. Thapsiis and V, Blattaria. We have only to leave 
absolute certainty of this last proposition to the next season. 
Thomas Meehan. 
The "Indian Peach."— John Lawson, who was in this country 
between 1700 and 3708, says in his New Voyage to Carolina (Lon- 
don, 1709), a propos of the peach: "I want to be satisfy 'd about one 
sort of this Fruit, which the Indians claim as their own, and affirm 
they had it growing amongst them before any Europeans came to 
America, The Fruit I will describe as exactly as I can. The tree 
grows very large, most commonly as big as a handsome Apple-tree; 
the Flowers are of a reddish murrey Colour; the Fruit is rather more 
downy than the yellow Peach, and commonly very large and soft, 
being very full of Juice. They part very freely from the Stone, and 
the Stone is much thicker than all the other Peach Stones we have, 
which seems to me that it is a Spontaneous Fruit of America; yet m 
those Parts of America that we inhabit, I never could hear that any 
