ON CORN 



Obviously an ear of corn of the modern variety 

 could not be supported on the slender tip of the 

 stalk where the tassels grow. 



We saw in the case of the potato plant that was 

 grafted on the stem of the tomato, that the tuber- 

 bearing buds might put out from the axils of the 

 leaves under these exceptional circumstances. 



Just what the circumstances may have been 

 that led to the bearing of its fruit buds exclusively 

 in the leaf axils in the case of the corn, we of 

 course cannot know. But presumably the anomaly 

 first appeared as a "sport", due without doubt to 

 some altered conditions of nutrition, from being 

 placed under unusual environment, and some one 

 had the intelligence to select this sport and breed 

 from it, with the result of developing a race of 

 corn bearing grain on the stalk that gradually 

 supplanted the old form altogether except, in- 

 deed, that the wild teosinte maintained the tradi- 

 tions of its ancestors, unspoiled by cultivation. 



I may add that the experiment of running the 

 tunicate corn back to the primeval wild type by 

 selective breeding is a much more simple one 

 than would be the attempt to run it forward within 

 a few generations to the plane of the good varie- 

 ties of cultivated corn, but even this is compara- 

 tively easy of accomplishment. 



To stimulate and accelerate degenerative 



[17] 



