POPULAR ERRORS AND SCIENTIFIC DOGMAS. 225 



grafted on a plain-leaved red variety will, as in the 

 Abutilon, blotch the leaves, but will in no way change 

 the color or condition of the double red flower. So in 

 the case of Buist's variegated red Althea, when grafted 

 on a double white ; it in no other way affects the color 

 or doubleness of the flower, but it again blotches the 

 leaves white with the disease, variegation. I consider it 

 was most unfortunate for Mr. Darwin to have advanced 

 the peculiarity of variegated leaves as bearing on his 

 theory of "graft hybrids," for almost in every instance 

 where a variegated variety is grafted on a plain green- 

 leaved stock, it taints the healthy plant with variegation, 

 though it changes it in no other respect ; just as a small- 

 pox victim may be marked with that disease, but in no 

 other way changed. 



Negative evidence is not usually good evidence, but 

 when we know that countless millions of fruits and flowers 

 have, in the past one hundred years, been budded and 

 grafted without the individuality of the variety being in 

 any way affected by the stock, and that only a few in- 

 stances, such as the Cytisus purpureus and the Bizzaria 

 Orange, can be cited as exceptions, is it not fair to infer 

 that these almost solitary cases are due to what Mr. 

 Darwin calls "Bud Variation ?" a condition by no means 

 uncommon in scores of families of plants which are never 

 budded or grafted. Nearly all of us see every season 

 scarlet, and scarlet and white striped Carnations on the 

 same plant. Dahlias are found crimson, crimson and 

 white, and sometimes almost white on the same plant. 

 Last spring we had plants of the double scarlet Hibiscus, 

 with scarlet, orange, and scarlet and orange three 

 distinct kinds of flowers on the same plant ; and that 

 wonderful freak of nature, the striped Tea Rose, 

 American Banner, was a " sport " from a plant of Bon 



