THE SHASTA DAISY 315 



through which these conditions are transmitted 

 to its descendants becomes more and more nota- 

 ble and pronounced. 



So it is that a plant that has lived for count- 

 less generations in Japan has acquired a pro- 

 found heredity tending to transmit a particular 

 set of qualities; and when we hybridize that 

 plant with another plant that has similarly 

 gained its hereditary tendencies through age- 

 long residence in Europe, we bring together two 

 conflicting streams that must fight against each 

 other and strangely disturb the otherwise equa- 

 ble current of hereditary transmission. 



Long experience with the hybrids of other 

 species of plants had taught me this, and hence 

 it was that I expected to bring about a notable 

 upheaval in the hereditary traits of my daisies 

 by bringing the pollen of a Japanese plant to 

 the stigmas of my hybrid European and Ameri- 

 can oxeyes. That my expectations were real- 

 ized, and more than realized, is matter of record 

 of which the present Shasta Daisy gives most 

 tangible proof. 



We shall see the same thing illustrated over 

 and over again in our subsequent studies. 



In offering this explanation of the extraordi- 

 nary conflict of tendencies, with its resulting new 

 and strange combination of qualities that re- 



