252 LUTHER BURBANK 



flowers of unusually rounded outline, not unlike 

 the form of a dahlia. 



Several of the best of these were introduced 

 through dealers. The clematis is somewhat sub- 

 ject to a disease usually ascribed to the same 

 cause that destroys lilies and many other plants 

 in cultivated soil. It is probably bacterial, and 

 is associated with thrips, millipeds, and eel- 

 worms, which probably serve to disseminate the 

 germs. 



Subsequently I began a series of hybridizing 

 experiments, using the Clematis coccinea as the 

 original seed parent. 



This species is herbaceous and has scarlet flask- 

 shaped flowers, with the sepals slightly opened 

 by the curling outward of their tips. The sepals 

 are thick and fleshy, although not leathery, giv- 

 ing the flower almost the appearance of a fruit. 



This species is not variable, about the only 

 diversity noticeable being a slight variation in 

 the size of the flowers. It produces seed freely, 

 and to the pistils of coccinea was apphed the 

 pollen of various other species; among these 

 being C. crispa, known as "Blue Bells," 

 C. Davidiana, C. Fremonti, C. ligusticifolia, 

 C. Douglasi, C. verticillaris, C. occidentalis , 

 C. Fortunei, C. Viticella, and others, no attempt 

 being made to keep the various crosses separate. 



