XXIX.] EARLY FORMS OF PETUNIAS. 471 



the inflated tube of its corolla and the size of its 

 embryo." The common form of mixed garden pe- 

 tunia is a diffuse plant, low and slender, like the old 

 P. violacea, but the tube is greatly lengthened and 

 reduced in diameter by the influence of P. nycta- 

 giniflora, and the colors sport into every combina- 

 tion of the purple and white of the original parents. 

 These little petunias assume a fairly permanent light 

 purple shade when left to themselves for a time, and 

 they then reproduce themselves with tolerable ac- 

 curacy ; and they afford an admirable example of a 

 hybrid which is abundantly fertile and which holds 

 its own year after year. 



Various curiously marked types of petunias have 

 appeared and are lost. One of the early forms had 

 a red body color, with grass -green borders. This 

 was figured by Harrison in 1838 under the name of 

 Petunia marginata prasina. These green -bordered 

 strains appear now and then, and Mr. Carman, in 

 using them in crossing experiments, obtained "ro- 

 settes of green leaves without the rudiments of calyx, 

 corolla, stamens or pistils."* A faintly striped va- 

 riety, called Petunia vittata, was also figured by Har- 

 rison at the same time. The stripes originated in 

 the throat of the flower and ran outwards, as they 

 do in most of the striped sorts of the present day ; 

 but in 1844 he announced a variety, Petunia Nixenii, 

 in which the stripes originate at the border of the 

 flower and proceed inwards. 



The most singular development in these hybrid 

 petunias is the appearing of the very broad -mouthed 

 fringed flowers, with short, sessile and more or less 



*Proc. Sixth Conv. Soc. Am. Plor. (1890). 



