Improved Races After Selection Ceases. 129 



and ripens only the best seeds; for the seeds which are 

 borne on the weaker lateral branches with which normal 

 beet plants are covered are well known to be poorer. 

 This method results in a far more stringent selection 

 of seeds than can be effected by means of sieves or centrif- 

 ugal machines ; and it seems that this selection wholly 

 or almost wholly counteracts the ill effects of degenera- 

 tion resulting from the cessation of selection. 



Intermediate generations are often indispensable, es- 

 pecially in the case of cereals. For it is obvious that in 

 races in which the pedigree stock is small, but for which 

 the demand is great, an enormous increase in the amount 

 of seed must be brought about before the seed can be 

 put on the market. But no race will stand more than 2 

 or at most 3 intermediate generations. Moreover if this 

 process is not carried out with the greatest care the value 

 of the race is lost. 



Conclusion. The instability of races is the central 

 fact on which all agricultural breeding processes are 

 based. The seed on the market is always inferior to 

 pedigree seed, if not in the first generation, at any rate 

 regularly in the second or third. And no matter how 

 long selection is carried on it cannot remove this in- 

 feriority. 



