160 TILLEES OF THE GBOUND CHAP. 



The next point is, suppose we sow the seeds 

 from the pod formed in this way, shall we get tall 

 peas or short peas ? Or shall we get both short 

 and tall peas ? That was the kind of question 

 that Mendel set himself to answer. Gardeners 

 and others who work at these questions find it 

 convenient to have a word to signify the plants 

 which result from a crossing. When- we go to a 

 flower show we quite often find a flower or a vege- 

 table labelled so-and-so's new kybrid-TOBQ or new 

 hybrid-cabbage. The word hybrid means that the 

 plant has been produced by crossing two varieties 

 of plants. 



Using this convenient word " hybrid," then, we 

 may state more exactly what Mendel wanted to 

 do. He wanted to cross two kinds of plants, 

 differing from one another in one or a few clearly 

 marked features, and then to sow all the seed 

 obtained in order to try to find out the exact propor- 

 tions in which the parent plants would appear in 

 the hybrids. 



But we are not really so very much concerned 

 here as to what he wanted to find out, as to under- 

 stand what he did, in order to understand what 

 crossing and breeding means. 



The first thing was to find suitable plants 

 for his experiments. After some time he decided 

 that the Pea family was the best, and after growing 



