AMERICA'S CHIEF CROP 329 



variety. These were, without doubt, the first ex- 

 periments in this special line ever made with 

 corn. They have of course been duplicated a 

 thousand times since. 



The most important experiments then made 

 had to do with crossing the yellow field corn 

 with the Early Minnesota and other varieties of 

 sweet corn, my intention being to produce a 

 sweet corn with yellow kernels. There was a 

 demand for such a variety, and none existed 

 anywhere at that time. 



I succeeded in producing hybrids that com- 

 bined the yellow color of the field corn with the 

 sweetness of the other variety, but had not thor- 

 oughly fixed the new variety so that it would 

 uniformly breed true from seed at the time when 

 I removed to California, in 1875; and this inter- 

 rupted the corn experiments. 



In the meantime, however, I had gained valu- 

 able lessons in heredity from observation of the 

 crossbred corn, beans, potatoes, and other vege- 

 tables and flowers. 



In the second generation numerous fine pure 

 yellow ears were obtained without a trace of 

 white, but a part of the kernels were hard and 

 smooth, and not the wrinkled sweet corn that 

 was desired. In the following generation, when 

 the corn was grown in California, I obtained 



