CHARACTERS OF HINDI HYBRIDS. 33 



can usually bo rec()<,niize(l inucli more readily Ijy inspecting the vege- 

 tative characters of the plants in the earlier stages of development 

 than after the crop is ripe and the damage of cross-fertilization has 

 been done. It takes only an instant to see that the foliage or the 

 habits of growth of a plant are different from those of its neighbors, 

 much less time than is required to judge plants by their lint and 

 seed characters at maturity, after the external differences of leaves, 

 flowers, and bolls are no longer to be appreciated. 



The breeder in search of new varieties may find it desirable to pre- 

 serve all the sports or freak plants that he can find to see whether in 

 some rare cases they may not prove superior to normal plants of the 

 ^•ariety. but the farmer who follows this course will lead his variety 

 to degeneration. He must rely on the fact that the vast majority of 

 the plants that diverge from the characters of the variety represent 

 degenerations. His policy is to ])nll all the aberrant jdants as soon 

 as they can be detected. If allowed to remain, they will destroy the 

 uniformity of the stock." 



INTENSIFICATION OF CHARACTERS IN HYBRIDS. 



Another deviation from the Mendelian expression of characters in 

 cotton hybrids is found in cases where characters are suppressed or 

 intensified be3'ond the range of variation of the parental types. The 

 crossing of the P^gyptian cotton with short-staple Upland varieties 



"A writer in the Liverpool Daily Post and Mercury (Saturday, March 12, 

 1910) maintains that periods of prosperity for the Egyptian cotton industry 

 ha\e followed the introduction of new varieties and that periods of depression 

 ensued as the varieties degenerated: 



" It is to be remarked that each time a new variety of seed was sown for 

 the first time of cultivating an increase was immediately obtained of 1 to li 

 cantars weight per feddan. and as high as 12 to 14 per cent in the ginning 

 yield. This increase diminished with the passing years and by slow degrees 

 the seeil degenen-.ted. The excellent results of the beginning did not bear out 

 their early jn-omise. and after a lapse of time of more or less duration the seed 

 CTdtivated had to be abandoned to give place to a new variety. * * * 



"An<l it is the same story. As in lSf>2, when the .Tumel, old and degenerated, 

 had to be abandoned, as in 1892 the Ashmuni had to be replaced by Mitaffifi, so 

 to-day the ilitatlifi seems coming to the end of its career, and no one can deny 

 the degeneration of quality. 



•' While in l.SOl, l.S!)2. and 1893 it yielded 7 to S cantars per feddan on the 

 best lands and 5 to (i on the others, at the present day it never gives either 7 

 or 8 cantars, and in Lower Egypt its production has certainly diminished by 1 

 to li cantars per feddan on an average. This cotton, which during the first 

 years of its cultivation yielded 110 to 114 in ginning, no longer gives to-day 

 more than 101 to 103, and that with difficulty. * * * 



"Seventeen years, therefore, had sufficed for the degeneration of Jumel, and 

 it is exactly after the same lapse of time that we are forcetl to notice the 

 degeneration of Mitaffifi." 

 210 



