Ranunculus Bulbosus Semiplemts. 257 
NUMBER OF 
FLOWERS PETALS PER FLOWER 
A. On the ma:'n stem: 
1. Terminal flower 75 697 9.3 
2. Secondary flowers 221 2005 9.1 
3. Tertiary " 134 1237 9.3 
B. From the tuber: 
4. Secondary flowers 259 2419 9.3 
5. Tertiary 397 3716 9.4 
6. Quaternary 111 1014 9.1 
1197 11088 9.3 
It is evident that the number of petals in the various 
groups is practically the same. 1 
Even the seeds of pleiopetalous flowers are by no 
means better. In gathering the harvest of 1891 I col- 
lected the seed on each plant in a separate bag with ref- 
erence to the number of petals of the flowers. The flow- 
ers were labelled for this purpose at the time of flowering. 
In the culture of 1892, therefore, the plants were arranged 
in groups, first according to their seed-parents, and sec- 
ondly according to the petal-number of the flowers from 
which the seed had been gathered. I then grouped all of 
the figures by the latter character and obtained the fol- 
lowing result : 
NUMBER OF PETALS IN THE MEAN NUMBER NUMBER 
FLOWERS WHICH OF PETALS OF FLOWERS 
FURNISHED THE SEED OF THE OFFSPRING 1 COUNTED 
C5-7 
C 8 
C 9 
C 10-11 
C 12-14 
Average 8.6 Total 5560 
1 In the weakening system of branching on the other hand the 
contrary seems to be the rule ; so for instance in my cultures of Sapo- 
naria officinalis with 5-10 petals, in Chrysanthemum scgetiini ( 18) etc. 
! The mean is slightly lower here than in the previous table be- 
cause that only refers to countings made in September. (See later.) 
8.3 
932 
8.7 
1072 
8.5 
1217 
8.6 
1420 
8.7 
919 
