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STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 



Extent of variation in the " A " crosses. ( IJ>90.) 



tially alike in color and shape, as shown in the above illustration. These 

 eight fruits, which were the parents of the plants discussed below, were as 

 follows : 



Al. Pollinated with another flower on the same plant. 



A2, Pollinated by Round White (original pietillate parent). 



A3. Pollinated by Black Pekin (original staminate parent). 



A4. Same as A3. 



A5. Pollinated with another flower on same plant, as in \l. 



A6. Same as A5. 



A7. Pollinated by Round White, as in A2. 



A8. Selection, not artificially pollinated. 



From these eight fruits, 1,405 plants were grown at Cornell in 1891.* 

 The behavior of these plants is indicated by the table which closes this 

 article. It is interesting to note the influence of Black Pekin in A3 and A4. 

 into which this variety .has twice entered as a staminate parent. All the 

 plants, 203 in number, were purple in foliage and like Black Pekin in habit; 

 and most of the fruits were solid purple, although a few striped fruits still 

 showed the influence of the Round White two generations back. The ones 

 into which the Round Whit^ entered twice- -A2 and A7 — do not show so 

 strongly the marks of the double infusion of blood. In A2, there were a 

 few more plants with green than with purple herbage and the green ones 

 were more productive than the ('thers; these are marks of the Round White, 

 and it may also be said that even the purple plants were of a light cast and 

 that nearly all showed the influence of the tlwarf habit of Round White. 

 A7, the other Round White cross, produced a lot of small plants, but they 

 were unproductive, and much over half of them had purple herbage. 



Three of these lots — Al, Ao, A6 — were from fruits pollinated by a flower 

 on the same plant. These, then, according to popular notions, should pro- 

 duce uniform plants; but with that sublime contrariness which is so char- 

 acteristic of most of our results of crossing, these lots gave as variable 

 progeny as those which had better right to such possessions. In fact, the 



* Dnplicatps of all these egg-plants have been grown in Maine by Professor W. M. Mnnson, ■who will 

 poon report vijxin them. 



