SEED COKN. 39 



very well know that we frequently find two ears fully devel- 

 oped on a stalk, less often three, and rarely ever five or seven. 

 Such being the case, we are justified in believing that we may 

 be enabled to accomplish through our interposition this result 

 as a normal rather than exceptional result. We may influ- 

 ence and even increase the tendency of these usually abortive 

 ears to develop into kernel through cultivation, but our great 

 hope must be in the proper fixing of an inherited tendency, 

 by a strict attention to the selection of the seed. Before, 

 however, entering upon this consideration, we will outline 

 some botanical features of the plant. 



Maize is what the botanists call "monoecious," that is to 

 say, its male and female bloom is borne on different portions 

 of the plant. The tassel bears the male or staminiferous 

 organs aloft, above the rest of the plant, the female or pistil- 

 liferous portion being arranged along the cob, which is mor- 

 phologically a branch and which is placed between the leaf 

 sheath and the culm or stalk, forming a grouping by them- 

 selves corresponding in position in the same variety. The 

 male flowers bear pollen in their anther cells, which being 

 set free is carried upon the silks, the stigmatic surfaces of the 

 pistils, which its contents enter through a provision of its 

 physiological nature, and passing down mingle with the con- 

 tents of the ovule which is thus enabled to carry forward its 

 development into a seed. But mark this : the pollen is usu- 

 ally cast ofl' from the tassel before the pistil of the plant is 

 ready to receive it. We thus see a clear provision of nature 

 in favor of the pollen serving to fertilize another ear than the 

 one on the plant which bears it, and we must suspect, what 

 the accurate experiments of Darwin has shown to be the fact, 

 that self-fertilization must be injurious to the species. Let 

 us remember this, for we shall see its application a little 

 further on. 



Now, if we have a peculiarly prolific stalk of corn, its seed 

 does not probably receive its pollen from itself, but from 

 another adjoining a distant plant, and the character of this 

 pollen is to influence the succeeding generations which spring 



