FLOWER POSSIBILITIES 207 



tion of any given trait of the mother plant 

 which in this case is the father plant as well. 



The practical results have been already illus- 

 trated in the production of this new race of 

 Heuchera with leaves crinkled and corrugated 

 in unique fashion so that they differ funda- 

 mentally from the characteristic leaves of any 

 other species or variety. 



The lesson to be drawn, then, from this experi- 

 ment is that when we wish to modify a plant as 

 to some particular feature of its anatomy, we 

 shall proceed to best advantage if we (1) select 

 an individual that shows the most marked de- 

 parture from the normal in the desired direction 

 of any that can be found; (2) isolate this plant 

 so that its flowers shall be self-fertilized, or else 

 hand-pollenize them; and then (3) follow out a 

 similar course of selection of the best individual 

 and self-fertilization of its flowers through suc- 

 cessive generations until the maximum amount 

 of variation in the desired direction has been pro- 

 duced. It sometimes hastens the process to com- 

 bine two or more of the best plants by crossing 

 rather than to depend on a single one. 



We shall see in other connections, as indeed 

 we have previously seen in our studies of many 

 plants, that it is frequently desirable to stimulate 

 variation by hybridizing plants that are diver- 



