320 WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Wild (of the Hawaiian Islands). On the other hand the following have 



naked seeds : G. Kirkii (of East Tropical Africa), and G. taitense (of 

 the Polynesian Islands). But in passing it may be here observed that 

 no Asiatic indigenous cotton has a naked seed. And lastly the majority 

 of the Asiatic fuzzy-seeded cottons have the pollen-grains covered 

 with opaque triangular spines (see Plates Nos. 52, ff. 7, 8 and 9, and 53, 

 f. 15) while the corresponding American series have the grains mostly 

 with a thin palisade wall (see Plates Nos. 52, ff. 5, and 53, ff. 14 and 

 17) and sometimes a few straight hyaline spines. But let it be here 

 added that there is at least another great group of cultivated cottons 

 characterised by the existence of very large hyaline triangular spines 

 that seem as if buttressed on to the intine. This to some extent 

 coincides with the naked-seeded cottons (see Plate No. 53, ff. 11, 

 16 and 20). The manifestation, therefore, of these peculiarities, in 

 certain cultivated or long acclimatised plants, may safely be regarded 

 as denoting definite influences and not accidental sports nor even 

 climatic adaptations. 



I have elsewhere (pp. 27-36, 41-2, 55, 118, 203, &c.) given many 

 particulars regarding the colour, shape and twistings of the floss, 



Bed floss, and advanced arguments in favour of the red floss being regarded 

 as the generic type. Accepting that view it is only natural to 

 anticipate that a red floss would appear and reappear in all cultivated 

 cottons when neglected or grown under unfavourable influences, 

 the dominant condition being brought out on the disappearance of 

 the acquired characteristics. It is interesting to record, therefore, 

 in this connection that numerous writers have observed these 

 peculiarities even long anterior to the period of their explanation 

 on the theory of hybridisation. For example Spruce (' Notes on 

 Cult, of Cotton in Piura and Chira in N. Peru,' 1864, pp. 47-8) 

 says ' if a number of seeds taken from pods of perfectly white 

 cotton be sown together, a few of the plants are sure to produce only 

 brown cotton, and the browner it is the shorter and more brittle the 



Degenera- staple : so that the brown cotton plant is a mere degeneration from 

 the white. And yet the lint is rather pretty to the Indian's eye, so 

 much so, that he formerly considered it sacred, and limited its use to 

 his priests and Incas, and to his dead ; and at the present day he 

 weaves it alternately with the ordinary white cotton in stripes and 

 checks in his manias and listados' So again in a further page he 

 adds, ' It matters little whether we call these kinds species, varieties 

 or races. They are easily distinguished in the living state, and differ 



