PRESERVATION OF RACES. 353 



difficult in the case of annual plants, which comprise those 

 most cultivated by the farmer and the gardener. 



It is the general law of seeds, to propagate species only to 

 which they belong ; hence, we cannot rely upon any par- 

 ticular variety of the species. There is, however, a tendency 

 to produce a seedling more nearly resembling the parent, than 

 any other variety of the species. There will, therefore, be a 

 majority of plants either like, or better than the parent. By 

 selecting these for seed the second year, and obtaining in 

 each successive year those most resembling the original seed, 

 the variety will be in time established. Every cultivated grain 

 has doubtless passed through successive stages of perfection 

 in a similar way, and a new habit has hecomo, jixed. See p. 324, 



It is easy to learn how different varieties are produced ; 

 early or late varieties, for example. If a plant has been cul- 

 tivated for years in a warm, dry soil, where it ripens in 60 

 days, it will acquire an excitable habit ; and when sown in a 

 colder soil, will for a season, mature its fruit much earlier. 

 "The reverse will happen to an annual from a cold, wet 

 soil." But in both cases, if the plant be continued in the 

 same soil, it will change its habits ; hence, seedsmen ob- 

 tain seed from warm, dry soils, for their early vegetables ; 

 hence too, we may raise on cold lands certain crops, as barley 

 or Indian corn, provided the seed be procured from warm, 

 and dry soils. But how can these varieties be preserved 

 as their tendency is, to revert back to their wild state ? 



1. The best mode of preserving the variety is, to transplant 

 the plant shortly before it goes to seed. By this means the 

 character of the variety will remain. 



2. Another mode of preserving the variety is to cultivate 

 the crop so far from any other crop of the same species, that 

 there may be no intermixture of the pollen. This substance 

 is conveyed a considerable distance by the winds, and by in- 

 sects ; hence, seeds should not be saved from one or two in- 

 dividuals standing alone in a garden, as bees and other insects 



30 



