246 The Pedigree Families. 



1 % 0. lata 



1 % 0. nancUa. 



But the second plant gave a much "better" result for 

 the 200 seedlings were distributed as follows : 



8 % 0. Lamarckiana 

 69 % O. scintiUans 

 21 % O. oZ^/on^ra 



2 % 0. lata, O. nan ell a, etc. 



I fertilized about 25 of those O. scintiUans with their 

 own pollen. I sowed the seeds of each one separately 

 and got a proportion of scintiUans in the next generation 

 varying between 66 and 93 % about a mean of 84 %. 

 One plant seemed to give O. scintiUans only ; but the crop 

 from this plant was small. In 1899 and 1900 I continued 

 my experiments in the same way, in order to find out 

 whether this species could be brought, by selection, to the 

 same level of constancy as that which characterizes the 

 other elementary species. 



Perhaps some day there will appear in the Lamarc- 

 kiana-i2irm\y or in some other a scintiUans which will 

 breed true straight away. 



An estimation of the constancy of scintiUans mutants 

 has been made four times in all. Three times it gave 

 offspring like itself in the proportion of 34-39 % ; in the 

 next generation it did the same. In the fourth instance 

 the proportion was 69 % and the mean, in the next gen- 

 eration, had mounted to 84 %. These numbers show 

 in my opinion that 0. scintiUans is an inconstant species 

 which moreover tends to give rise on its first appearance 

 to other forms and especially to O. ohlonga.^ 



* The deviation in the first series of figures (15 % instead of 34- 

 39%) which occurred in a second generation, from a scintiUans 



