Vermont State Horticultural Society 55 



are not of the variety. Here the question of whether any plant 

 is of a variety or not is determined by its character and not as 

 with plants propagated by division, by its origin. Of two peas 

 from the same pod one may produce a plant exactly like the one 

 that produced it and a fine representative of the variety, while 

 the other may produce a very different plant which can not be 

 considered as of the variety at all. In the absence of any posi- 

 tive knowledge as to what the two seeds would produce and 

 assuming that they would both develop into plants like the one 

 that produced them the two seeds may be said to be of the same 

 variety, but the plants raised from them can not be said to be of 

 the same variety. Varieties with seeds as with fruit come into 

 existence because some one under a certain set of conditions 

 has found that plants of that type are more satisfactory for cer- 

 tain uses than those of any variety with which he is acquainted. 

 The qualities which make it desirable for this set of conditions 

 and for this use may be, indeed generally are, the very ones 

 which make it unfit for other conditions and uses: (Illustrated 

 in a comparison of the qualities of the Davis Wax and Yosemite 

 Wax beans and also in the difference of the types of the Refugee 

 Wax bean as sold by different seedsmen.) To ask a seedsman to 

 tell what is the best variety of bean or tomato without informa- 

 tion as to the conditions under which it is to be grown or use to 

 be made of the product is as unreasonable as to ask the druggist 

 what is the best medicine without any information as to who is 

 to take it and what it is to be taken for. 



Now the character of the plant which any given seed will 

 produce, its adaptation for any particular condition or use, is 

 determined by the balanced sum of the tendencies and character- 

 istics it received in different degrees from each of its ancestors 

 back for an indefinite number of generations. Sometimes the 

 mother plant is the dominant influence, again the mother may 

 have scarcely any controlling influence, while that of the great- 

 grandmother or some other ancestor still further back may be 

 the dominant one, so that we can only be sure as to the character 

 of the plant any individual seed will produce in proportion as 

 we know the exact characteristics of all its ancestors and that 

 they were identical. The importance then in the production of 

 seed which can be relied upon to produce plants of a certain 

 variety of a rigid adherence in breeding to plants of an exact 

 type, is evident. It is equally evident that there can be no rigid 

 adherence to type unless that type be clearly defined. Have 

 varietal types of our garden vegetables been so defined or 

 adhered to by seed growers, or so defined and described that 

 planters can easily learn the exact characteristics of the plants 

 any seed of any variety will produce? We have an abundance 



