ON PEAS AND BEANS 



tical response to the efforts of the plant developer. 

 Perhaps because the pea has been cultivated 

 under varied conditions, and selected for a wide 

 variety of qualities, this plant shows a marked 

 tendency to vary, suggesting in this regard the 

 evening primrose and the godetia, and the new 

 varieties are often practically fixed from the outset. 



With beans it is less easy to trace and classify 

 the opposing "unit" characters, and in practice it 

 is often necessary to select rigidly and continuously 

 for five or six successive generations in order to 

 fix a new variety. 



An illustration of the complexities that may 

 result when beans of different kinds are crossed 

 was given me at the outset of my work as a plant 

 developer. 



CROSSING THE POLE BEANS 



Almost my first experiment in hybridizing was 

 made by crossing the horticultural pole-bean or 

 wren's egg with another variety of pole-bean 

 known as the red cranberry bean. 



The hybridization was effected with some diffi- 

 culty, inasmuch as only one blossom in perhaps 

 fifty responded to cross-pollenization and a part 

 of the offspring seemed to lack vitality, as I suc- 

 ceeded in bringing but one plant to maturity. But 

 this was in some respects the most astonishing 

 bean plant that I have ever seen. It bore long 



[97] 



