husks were considerably longer than the ears which they 
subtended and that, instead of tightly enclosing the ears, 
they constituted an open involucre at the base of the ear. 
The La Perra specimens tend to support and to amplify 
these conclusions. 
A single specimen of a young ear shoot, partly chewed, 
shows clearly that at the time of emergence of the silks 
the pistillate spike is tightly enclosed in the husks. 
Taste IV. Length of intact shucks of La Perra maize compared with 
length of intact cobs of Early and Late Nal-Tel. 
Zone 
Total or 
Specimens A AB B Average 
No. shucks 4 15 2 21 
Length (mm. ) 135 142 135 140 
No. cobs 21 3 2 26 
Length (mm. ) 61 68 48 60 
Therefore, if the husks open to form an involucre, this 
must take place later as the pistillate spike matures. In 
a recent trip to Mexico, the senior author made a special 
effort to determine whether the flaring open of the husks 
at maturity is a characteristic of modern Nal-Tel and he 
discovered that many of the plants of this race do have 
this feature. It may well be, therefore, that the spread- 
ing of husks at maturity is a primitive characteristic 
which, in wild corn, was an important step in the mecha- 
nism of seed dispersal. 
Venation: The husks are also quite uniform with re- 
spect to their venation. With few exceptions, all of them 
have distinct parallel venation. In modern maize, where 
the husks are often stretched tightly around the mature 
ear, the aspect of parallel venation is partly lost as the 
anastamosing venation between the principal veins be- 
[141 ] 
