19 



shown us xoiiiu in spots on four of tho kernels, is an luu-oninion color 

 in corn, iind the Cuzco is not grown in the I'liited Stiites; so thiit it is 

 hiirdly prol)al)U' that the color here could have been due to the use of 

 ini])ure seed. Again the fact that the four kernels which exhibited 

 these spots proved to be undoubted hybrids, showing plainly their 

 Cuzco parentage, seems to the writer to prove conclusively that this 

 is a true case of xenia. It is also interesting to note that of the 

 forty-foui- true hy])rids only four of the original crossed kernels 

 showed xenia, so that in this case absence of xenia could not be taken 

 as an indication that the kernels had not been hybridized. 



Ex2>erimen.t Ic^ Hickory Kiiuj 9 X Ouzt'o 750 S . — The cross was 

 made on plants grown at Washington in 1898. One small ear was 

 harvested December 3, 1898. None of the kernels showed any indi- 

 cation of xenia, being pure wdiite like the mother parent. These 

 kernels were planted in the summer of 1899, but only one plant devel- 

 oped. This showed the characters of Cuzco, the male parent, in being 

 very robust, reaching a height of 11 feet -t inches, and having a pur- 

 plish green stem with three circles of anchor roots. The ear on this 

 plant was in))red August 19, 1899, but did not mature seed. 



Experiment Id, lliclory King 9 X Cuzco 759 $ . — The plants used 

 in this experiment were grown at Washington in 1898. The small ear 

 which matured was harvested December ?>, 18!>8. Only twenty kernels 

 resulted, of which four were heliotrope-purple (PI. I, tigs. 19 and 20), and 

 three had pui-plish-black spots similar to the kernels of experiment la, 

 figured in PI. I, iigs, 9-12. All of the other kernels were pure white. 

 No examination was made of the colored and spotted kernels to deter- 

 mine where the color was located. The plumbeous color of the Cuzco, 

 however, is located in the aleurone layer of the endosperm, and in 

 these cases also it was probably limited to that portion of the endo- 

 sperm. There would seem to be no doubt that the coloration in this 

 instance, as in the variegated kernels described under la, is a true case 

 of xenia or the immediate efiect of pollen. 



In 1899, 20 seeds resulting from this cross were planted at Lincoln, 

 Nebr., and produced eighteen plants, all of which were shown to be true 

 hybrids from their characters: (1) from the color of the stem, which 

 was purplish-green similar to the father parent, instead of green like 

 the Hickor}^ Khig; (2) from the larger number of whorls of anchor 

 roots, which varied from three to six in the hybrids, the peculiarity, 

 characteristic of the Cuzco, of producing numerous anchor roots being 

 accentuated in the hybrids; (3) in the lateness of the flowering and 

 maturing; (4) in the increased size due to the hybridization. (PL III, 

 figs. 1 and 2.) 



All of the eighteen true hybrids resulting from this series of experi- 

 ments, when compared with the sixteen varieties grown in the same 

 experimental field and with sorts grown in adjoining fields, were of very 



