THE POTATO ITSELF 303 



It follows that the twenty-three seedlings 

 were progeny of the second filial generation 

 of the original varieties that were crossed and 

 which produced the Early Rose. And this 

 fully accounts for the extraordinary range 

 of variation that the twenty-three seedlings 

 manifested. 



We have seen many illustrations of this tend- 

 ency to vary in the second filial generation of 

 hybridized species or varieties. We have ob- 

 served that the latent qualities of diverse strains 

 of ancestors are permitted to come to the surface 

 and make themselves manifest in the various 

 individuals of a second generation, once the tend- 

 ency to relative fixity has been broken up by 

 hybridization. So the twenty-three diversified 

 varieties of potatoes that grew from the single 

 seed ball merely furnish another illustration of a 

 principle that our studies in plant development 

 have made quite familiar. 



The case has interest, none the less, as pre- 

 senting evidence from a new source of the appli- 

 cation of a principle of heredity that can never 

 fail to excite surprise however often we see it 

 manifested. 



It follows that we should not necessarily ex- 

 pect the Burbank potato to breed true from the 

 seed, even if by rare exception a seed ball should 



