VOL. XXXI.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 535 



to impregnate these flowers, and they bore good ripe seed : which persuades 

 him that the farina may be carried from place to place by insects. 



I am of opinion this will not suit with Mr. Morland's scheme. For though 

 we may suppose the stamina of every flower to be loaded with a due proportion 

 of the farina, yet this accidental conveyance of it to a neighbouring flower, 

 may be rather less and not greater than is necessary : so that, if wanting, then 

 those embryos which had not received the determined particle into their bosom, ' 

 must be defective in bulk, or barren in growing, but here all were equally 

 filled. 



2. By a second letter, Oct. ig, 1721, Mr. Millar informs me, that he 

 bought a parcel of Savoy seeds of a neighbour, which he sowed, and planted 

 out the plants ; but was surprised to see the production : for he had half of 

 them red cabbages, and some white cabbages, and some Savoys with red ribs, 

 and some neither one sort nor other, but a mixture of all sorts together in one 

 plant. He went to the gardener to complain, who showed him that he was in 

 the same condition, but did not know how it should come to pass, for he was 

 sure he took special care in saving the seed. Being asked how and where he 

 planted them for seed, he showed him them under a south-west hedge, and 

 told him the manner in which he planted them : first, a dozen of white cab- 

 bages, then a dozen of Savoys, and then a dozen of red. On which Mr. 

 Millar immediately thought this happened by the effluvia impregnating the 

 uterus of each other ; and it is very common for our gardeners to plant white 

 and red cabbages together for seed, and they are as often disappointed by 

 having a degeneracy of both kinds, which they attribute to the soil, thinking 

 that is the cause: they send to Holland for a fresh supply of seeds, and say our 

 soil will not continue that sort good. 



This experiment is a most convincing argument for the eflluvia ; for did each 

 grain of the farina enter the pistillum to its proper uterus, this mongrel kind 

 would never be produced. For if the individual plant be in each grain of the 

 male farina, how can it be so far dismembered, as that one part shall go to the 

 making up of the ribs of red cabbage, and another to compose the rest of a 

 Savoy plant. 



Analogous to this, is what I lately observed in a spaniel bitch, of so good a 

 kind, that when she became proud, care was taken to let her have good dogs. 

 The litter she produced, consisted of puppies some piebald, like one of the 

 dogs that had lined her, of the same shape, colour and spots ; others like an- 

 other ; and a third partaking of both, with spots of the bitch interspersed. 



This is a farther confirmation of what I have advanced, Essay 4, p. 310, 



