BUD A'ARIATIONS 77 



the wealth of its rust Hora. To show one way in which the 

 study may be pursued, has been the purpose of this narrative. 

 It is best to begin at home where the same locality may be 

 visited repeatedly, and afterward to roam afield in search 

 of new forms and new conditions. At times even such a 

 seemingly unfavorable occurrence as a snow storm may be 

 turned to account by the enthusiastic hunter for plant-rusts. 



SUGGESTIONS CONCERNING CERTAIN 

 BUD VARIATIONS. 



By Ed\aard M. East. 



It is to be regretted, that in spite of the marked interest 

 in bud-variation, it has been given but little analytical study. 

 Perhaps this is because the comparati^•e rarity of their 

 occurrence makes laboratory material difficult to obtain. 

 Even in De Vries' monumental work, where much might have 

 been expected, the subject is given only a scant ten pages; 

 and no explanation to fit our modern biology is submitted. 

 One glimpse of light is given by Darwin, however, when 

 he suggests that a few of these phenomena might be 

 explained by "segregation of the paternal characters in 

 seminal hybrids by bud-variation." The thought is almost 

 a precursor to the conception of unit characters. 



My own idea of bud-variation is that it is much the 

 same as germinal mutation; although there is little direct 

 proof of this statement. But we must admit that if mutation 

 ;s due to some shufHing and distribution beyond the normal, 

 of the cell units that are the basis of somatic characters; 

 then the same stresses and strains that produce such changes 

 upon the germ cell, should produce analogous changes upon 

 the somatic cells that lay down certain plant organs. We 

 should probably find the vegetati\e changes the rarer of the 

 two, because conditions during cell division are more nearly 

 uniform with branches from the same rootstock than with 

 separate individuals. The idea of the similitude of both 



