The Significance of the Atavists. 525 
30% individuals with fasciations. In the two following 
generations they were much more abundant. In the sixth 
there were 65% fasciated specimens, in a culture of 220 
plants, and these afforded me sufficient material for a 
statistical examination. For this purpose I collected, 
shortly before the ripening of the seed, all the aberrant 
flowers from a certain number of plants, and counted the 
number of the divisions of the fruit or that of the stig- 
mas of 120 individual flowers taken at random. The 
figures which I obtained were as follows : 
NUMBER OF 
Stigmas 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 
Flowers 13 945 10 15 2 2 10 15 63 7593 1 1 
I did not count the normal flowers, but their number 
far exceeded that of the whole group of the fasciated 
ones. In the curve in Fig. 121, in which the above series 
of figures is graphically displayed, the apex representing 
the atavists is therefore only formally indicated. The 
secondary peaks fall at 11 (10), 15 and 20 pistils, and 
the normal pentamery of the flowers is thus clearly re- 
peated in these multiple figures. 1 
Besides illustrating this curious fact, the curve shows 
that low grades of fasciation are relatively rare and that 
atavistic and normal flowers constitute two distinct 
groups, although connected by intermediate stages. 
Let us now summarize the conclusions we have come 
to in regard to fasciated eversporting varieties. 
1. The races always consist of fasciated individuals 
and atavists. 
2. The proportion of the former varies greatly, of- 
ten amounting to only 40% or less, but not infrequently 
1 A further inquiry into this point is, in my opinion, urgently 
called for. 
