IBREGULAB PELORIA. 237 



deviations from the ordinary form of one plant repre- 

 sent the ordinary condition of another ; thus, the peloric 

 Calceolarias resemble the flowers of Fabiana, and De 

 Candolle,^ comparing the peloric flowers of Scrophula- 

 rlaceoi with those of SolanaceWy concluded that the 

 former natural order was only an habitual alteration 

 from the type of the latter. Peloric flowers of Pajn- 

 lionacece in this way are indistinguishable from those 

 of Bosacece. In like manner we may trace an analogy 

 between the normal one-spurred Delphinium and the 

 five-spurred columbine {Acjidlegia), an analogy 

 strengthened by such a case as that of the five- 

 spurred flower of Delphinium datum described by 

 Godron." The Gwydalis, before referred to, is another 

 illustration of the same fact, the structure being the 

 same as in Dielytra, &c. 



The ordinary irregular flowers may possibly be 

 degenerated descendants of a more completely organ- 

 ized ancestor, and some of the cases of peloria may 

 therefore be instances of reversion; some ancient 

 Linaria may, perhaps, have had all its petals spur- 

 shaped, and the cases of irregular peloria now found 

 may be reversions to that original form. When both 

 regular and irregular forms of peloria occur on the 

 same plant, as they frequently do in Linaria^ the one 

 may be perhaps considered as a reversion to a very 

 early condition, the other to a later state, when all the 

 petals were irregularly formed. But before we can 

 assert the truth of this surmise we must have better 

 evidence as to what the original condition really was 

 than we have at present. 



The proximate cause of iiTegular peloria has been 

 considered to be excess of nourishment, but evidence 

 as to this point is very conflicting. Willdenow states 

 that " radices peloriae, solo sterili plantatse, degenerant 

 in Linariam," (' Sp. Plant.,' iii, p. 254); but this opinion 

 is counterbalanced by that of others, while the frequent 



' 'Thc-or. Elera..' ed. 2, p. 266. 



* Cited in ' Bull. Soc. Bot. France,' vol. xiii (Rev. Bibl.), p. 81, 



