Ranunculus Bulbosus Seuiiplenus. 253 



versely one-sided. But we are dealing here merely with 

 a cumulative effect within a half race and not with an 

 isolated, fully developed race. I have chosen a number 

 of variants from the two categories, have added up the 

 number of their petals, and obtained the following data : 



Petals: 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 23 



Number of flowers y^.- 66 34 21 18 15 11 7 2 10 



" M: 13 14 22 28 51 26 16 12 6 4 2 1 1 



V: 9 11 26 39 62 79 148 84 30 8 4 3 2 1 1 



These data are exhibited graphically in Fig. 52. They 

 relate to three small groups of individuals, chosen in 

 such a way that the curves of the individual plants did not 

 exhibit any considerable deviations from the mean of the 

 group. A is the curve of the twelve atavists extracted 

 from the whole series of observations; the maxima of 

 all their curves were at 5 petals. M is a curve represent- 

 ing ten plants grown from the seeds of a single seed- 

 parent. V is the curve composed of all the plants the 

 apex of whose individual curves lay above 10. There 

 were 22 of them altogether; the apices of their curves 

 were at 11, with three exceptions which were at 12 and 

 13, l)ut tliese curves did not exercise anv marked effect 

 on tlie shape of the average curve of the whole group. 



If Fig. 51 and Fig. 52 are compared a most remark- 

 able similarity will be observed. The latter figure gives 

 tlie composition of my race at the end of a process of 

 selection extending over five generations, the former re- 

 lates to the separate stages in this process. This mutual 

 resemblance lies in the fact that the original half curve 

 (Fig. 51, H 1887) continues to appear throughout the 

 process, although it is a little flattened; it occurs in 18Q1 

 (Fig. 51, E 1891) and also in 1892 (Fig. 52 A). Ata- 

 vistic fluctuation therefore is still exhibited l)v mv race 



