33 



unusual features in their blooming; but that summer 

 the majority of the roses developed from their centres 

 new buds which often opened up in full bluom before 

 the first flower had withered so that two roses, both 

 of the same size, grew around the same axis, one a 

 little above the other. 



In another garden belonging to Mr. G. W. Merry- 

 weather, also in Avondale, grew several pink rose 

 bushes which that summer — but never before —showed 

 a similar continuation of the floral axis beyond the 

 flower; but here the axis grew out as a regular foliage- 

 bearing branch, sometimes reaching a length of three 

 inches or more before the petals of the flower fell off". 

 After the petals had fallen, the shortened joints which 

 had born the sepals and petals could be clearly dis- 

 tinguished. The branch continued to grow all summer 

 as vigorously as the other branches which had not born 

 any floral leaves. 



He also mentioned that in a garden in Da\'ton, 

 Kentucky, some cherry trees were said to have pro- 

 duced similar reduplications ol flowers, that same 

 summer of 1896, and that in several instances both 

 flowers had born fruit, although, presumably, the first 

 ( inner ) cherry, through which the axis had pushed out 

 to devlop the second flower, had no seed. He had not 

 had opporrunity to see any of these cherries but the 

 report had been made to him by a trustworthy man, 

 Mr. McLaughlin, the Janitor of the Cincinnati Mu- 

 seum of Natural History. It was also stated that no 

 such phenomenon had ever before been observed on the 

 same cherry trees. 



As a possible explanation of these phenomena, Dr. 

 Lindahl offered the following suggestion. It is well 

 known that the heat of a few spring days, already in 

 March, often causes the fruit trees and rose bushes to 

 produce an early crop of flowers which are suddenly 

 killed by a late frost. Nevertheless the same trees will 

 produce a new crop of flowers after settled warm 



