SECT. III. INDUCTION OF PARTICULAR PROOFS. 323 



produced perfect seeds. Upon this principle gar- 

 deners now assist the impregnation, or what they 

 call the setting of the fruit, at least in the case of 

 their Melons and Cucumbers, by means of sprink- 

 ling the pollen of the male flowers over the pistils 

 of the females. But if a plant has more than one 

 pistil, and you apply the pollen only to that one, 

 then that one only will ripen seed. 



Evper. 3. If the stigma of the pistil is cut off The stig- 

 before the discharge of the pollen, no fecundation m 

 ensues ; and the fruit is inferior both in quantity and 

 quality. Of this experiment I have not been able 

 to procure the proper examples : but it shows that it 

 is by no means a matter of indifference to what part 

 of the pistil the pollen is applied ; for unless it 

 enters by the stigma it cannot be conveyed to the 

 ovary. 



Exper. 4. If the stigma of a flower that has Sprinkled 

 been stripped of its stamens before the bursting of ^ from" 

 the anthers is sprinkled with the pollen of a plant J^^* 

 of a different species, then the seeds will not only species, 

 ripen arid produce perfect plants when sown, but 

 these plants will partake of the qualities both of the 

 fecundating and fecundated species. The pollen of 

 the Tragopogon pratensis, whose petals are yellow, 

 when sprinkled on the stigmas of the flower of the 

 Tragopogon purpureus, whose petals are purple, 

 yielded seeds that produced plants with both purple 

 and yellow flowers. Hence botanists account for 

 the existence of what are called spurious plants, at- 



Y 2 



