Miscellaneous Intelligence. 443 



ing to Nandin this is true of the races otily inter se. A good illustration 

 of the imniedmte and great variation from this catise in the fruit of C. 

 Pepo is given in Naudin's third plate, where fifteen dift'erent forms of 

 the fruit are figured, taken from as many individual plants raised from 

 seeds of one fruit, which had grown in the vicinity of other varieties. 

 It is by no means certain, however, that all these forms originated from 

 direct crossing. But the species themselves strangely refuse to hybridize. 

 JVaudin carefully experimented with the five species in cuItiVation at the 

 Jardin des Flanf.es (viz., all "known, except C. diyitala) : and out of seV' 

 enty dist]nct trials all but five were utterly ineftectual. In five instances 

 the frait set, indeed, but in none of tlie^e was a single seed containing 

 the vestige of an embryo produced 1 What are we to think, then, of the 

 universal belief that squashes are spoiled by pumpkins grown in their vi- 

 cinity^ or pumpkins by squashes; and even melons (which are of a differ- 

 ent genus) by squashes? Tlie fact of some such influence seems to be 

 vreli autlienticated. Dr. Dariino^ton, one of the most trustworthy of ob- 

 servers, speaks of it from his own knowledge, thus: — "When growing in 

 the vicinity of squashes the fruit [of the pumpkin] is liable to be con- 

 verted into a kind of hybrid, of little or no value. I have had a crop of 

 pumpkins totally spoiled by that cause, tlic fruit becoming very hard and 

 warty, unfit for the table and unsafe to give to cattle." — (/7. CesU\^ ed. 2, 



p. 555.) 



Now^ that this is not the effect of hybridation is clear from the fact 

 that the result appears in the fruit of the season, not in that of the next 

 year, viz., in a generation originated by the crossing. A clue is perhaps 

 furnished by Naudin's observations, that t!ie ovary is apt to set and even 

 develop into a fruit in consequence of the application of the pollen of 

 another species, although, as the result proves, none of the ovules are fer- 

 tilized. And he hazards the conjecture that the pollen may exert a spe- 

 cific influence first upon the ovary, inciting its farther development, and 

 then upon the ovules. To test this conjecture he was to examine the ac- 

 tion, if any there be, of the pollen of Cucurbita upon the ovary of melons. 

 The past summer, — which has been as unusually warm in Western Eu- 

 rope as it has been cool in this country, —must have favored such re- 

 searches in Paris ; and we may expect soon to hear of the result. Im- 

 probable as such an influence seem^ to be, it is hardly more so than the 

 now authenticated fact that the graft of a variegated variety of a Jihrub 

 or tree will slowly infect the stock, so that the variegation will at length 

 break out in the foliaire of the natural branches;— an old observation, 

 which, according to the Gardener's Chronicle, has recently been verified 

 in several instances. 



A. G. 



W. MISCELLANEOUS SCIE:.^TIFIC INTELLIGENCE- 



1. Studies in Organic Morphology; an Abstract of Lectures delivered 

 before the Pottsville" Scientific Association in J 855 and 1856, contaitimg 

 liistorical notes of this branch of science, together svith original formuUe 

 and constructions of curved lines, designed to assist in the iniitHtion of 

 organic forms; bj John Wakken. 58pp. 8vo. Philadelphia, 1857, 



t' 



