ON THE ONION FAMILY 



appeared a mutant having a blossom of bright red 

 color instead of the usual rather dull crimson. 



As the chive can be multiplied indefinitely by 

 division, this single plant might have become the 

 progenitor of a race of red flowering chives. But 

 I wished to see what the hereditary tendency 

 would be, and so raised about ten thousand 

 seedlings from the red flowering stock. Nearly 

 all of these seedlings reverted to a pink color. 

 There had been a faint tinge of rosy pink in the 

 original flower, obscured by the crimson, but the 

 new seedlings bore blossoms of a pleasing pink 

 color, and constitute a new and highly attractive 

 variety. 



While thus developing a pleasing flower and 

 thereby adding to the attractiveness of the chive 

 as a border plant, I paid attention also to the bulb 

 and stalk of the plant itself as well as to the flavor. 



In the course of five or six generations I 

 developed the bulb so that the average size is 

 about twenty times that of the bulbs of the stock 

 with which we began. 



Thus the new race of chives not only supplies 

 a pink flower which has a very handsome effect 

 when massed in contrast with the characterless 

 flowers of its ancestor, but it is also relatively 

 gigantic in bulb as compared with them. Thus 

 its value as an ornamental plant and its utility as 



[149] 



