693 



between P. veris and P. vulgaris. The specific identity, however, of 

 the cowslip and primrose being once admitted, the notion of the 

 oxlip being a mule production (to which its occurrence in localities 

 producing only one or other of the plants is a solid objection) falls to 

 the ground immediately. The cowslip may be regarded as a con- 

 tracted, and, so to speak, concentrated, form of the primrose, with 

 smaller leaves and flowers, which last are more highly coloured and 

 more powerfully scented, the sulphur yellow of the latter becoming 

 exalted into golden yellow, and the five tawny watery rays around 

 the orifice of the tube heightened into as many well-defined, deep 

 orange dots ; the peduncles and calyx segments shorter, the limb of the 

 corolla contracted, and hence cupped or concave, and the leaves con- 

 stricted in the middle, each of these differences denoting a concentra- 

 tion or abridgment of the organs of the entire plant, displaying itself 

 exactly in proportion to the degree in which the specimen recedes 

 from the typical primrose towards the normal cowslip. In the words 

 of Mr. H. C. Watson (Phytol. iii. 44), which express my own senti- 

 ments on the subject, "Even those botanists who refuse faith in the 

 carefulness or exactness of the experiments on record, may see with 

 their own eyes that the intermediate links do exist (between genuine 

 primroses and cowslips). Indeed, they may be raised by any body, 

 may be seen in many gardens, or may be found wild by diligent 

 search. Nevertheless, while I see no escape from the necessity of 

 doing so, I am still somewhat reluctant to place cowslip and primrose 

 as a single species. The fact, once fairly admitted, of such exten- 

 sive varieties of a single species, must throw doubt upon thousands 

 of supposed species as they now stand recorded and described in 

 books." The question of the specific identity or diversity of the 

 primrose and cowslip, with all the light apparently thrown upon it, is 

 still beset with difficulty ; and I see no more plausible way of solving 

 the problem than by placing these two plants in the category of 

 what are called permanent races, in each of which certain individuals 

 are found evincing a tendency to pass over reciprocally to their oppo- 

 site limits of structural divergency, the change in each individual 

 being more or less complete or imperfect according to the force or 

 feebleness of the nixus impelling it to deviate towards either extreme, 

 the impulse itself dependant on, or influenced by, soil, climate, or oc- 

 cult causes beyond our present ken and inquiry. It seems placed 

 beyond doubt that the seeds of the primrose are capable of producing 

 cowslips and every intermediate grade betwixt these two, or in other 

 words, all the puzzling varieties to which we give the name of oxlip ; 



