176 PLANT HYBRIDIZATION BEFORE MENDEL 



great majority being yellow. There was no ear with yellow seeds 

 exclusively. 



The clear grey seeds, (c), produced two ears, on which the pro- 

 portions of seeds were reported as follows : pure yellow, ^4 ; yel- 

 low and speckled grey, about ^g ; reddish-grey, 1/12 ; and dark 

 reddish-grey and brownish-red, ^. 



This is the only instance in Gartner's maize experiments in 

 which the numbers in the second generation are reported. 



The seeds of (d) did not germinate. 



While the experiment has not particular genetic value, inasmuch 

 as the parents were not selfed lines, and close-pollination is not 

 reported as having been effected in the case of the F^, the work is 

 interesting historically. 



Gartner considered the fact noteworthy, as he states (p. 325) 

 that red-and-yellow striped seeds were derived from the grey 

 seeds, and notes that the stripes concentrated about the point of 

 insertion of the style, his actual object of investigation being to 

 determine whether, in the case of Zea mays^ as in Pisum^ an im- 

 mediate effect was produced by foreign pollen. He considered the 

 fact to have been demonstrated in the negative by his experiment. 



"since it is, however, determined, that the color of the seeds of Zea 

 mays do not immediately undergo an alteration through foreign polli- 

 nation, but that the capacity for the color change indicated is first pro- 

 duced in the germ through hybrid fertilization, and the different colors 

 of the seeds appear for the most part separate and without order on the 

 ears of the second generation ; it is therefore to be doubted that the 

 previously mentioned stripes produced in the second generation through 

 the fertilization process with their own pollen proceed from the point 

 of insertion of the pistil (stigma), but that they proceed rather from 

 the base of the seed, run through the outer layer of the testa, and unite 

 at the apex of the seed at the base of the pistil ; so that the reason there- 

 for is to be sought, not in the fertilization material, but in the rudiment 

 of the unfertilized egg." {ib., p. 326.) 



The remark is of interest as a sort of genetic conclusion, in 

 which morphological reasoning was involved, the fact of the con- 

 veyance of the stripes in the seed toward the base of the stigma 

 being assumed by Gartner to be prima facie evidence of the fact 

 that the "influence" of the pollen ("Befruchtungssubstanz") af- 

 fected the morphology of the seed from the point of entrance of 

 the pollen into the ovary at the base of the stigma. Since this rea- 

 soning antedated any knowledge of the manner in which fertiliza- 

 tion actually took place. It is not particularly surprising. It is. 



