188 



Davis. 



I trust, have iuforinatiou on the cytohipcal concUtious throughout the 

 life history of the hybrids that may make it possible to understand their 

 remarkable behanor. These reciprocals are of extraordinary interest 

 only surpassed by the conclusions reported by de Veies for the double 

 reciprocals, sesquireciprocals and iterative hybrids. 



(2) Reciprocal Crosses between Oenothera biennis Linnaeus 

 aud O. franriscatid Bartlett. 



These reciprocal hybrids involved the Dutch l)iennis of the same 

 parent stock as that employed iu the cross with 0. muricata where its 

 description will be found. The other parent was a species recently 

 isolated by Babtlett ('14) from among- the Oenotheras of the Pacific 

 coast and named by Mm Oenothera fmnciscana. Babtlett obtained 

 the plant through seed collected at Carmel Beach, Monteray County, 

 California, by Prof. Charles P. Smith in 1905. B^vrtlett has grown 

 the plant through three successive years and found it stable. I had 

 last summer (1913) a culture of 52 plants from self-pollinated seeds 

 supplied by Babtlett and noted no tendency to depart from the type. 

 The plant has also come to me through seed collected in San Mateo 

 County, California, by Miss Alice Eastwood. From tMs wild seed 

 I grew last summer 140 plants which were uniform and of the same 

 general type as the descendants of the plant from Monteray County. 

 It is probable that Oenothera franciscana is not uncommon in certain 

 regions of California and it may prove to be widely distributed. 



Mr. Babtlett first called my attention to Oenothera franciscana 

 as a plant having characters which in combination mth those of the 

 Dutch l)iennis might give hybrids very close to 0. Lamarckiana 

 de Veies, and in 1912 we made reciprocal crosses between the species, 

 exchanging pollen by post so that he made the cross franciscana X bi- 

 ennis in his garden at Washington and I the reciprocal cross, biennis 

 X franciscana in my garden at Philadelphia. The reciprocal liylirids 

 from these pollinatious, grown in my garden in 191;!, furnislied the 

 material for this account. 



I sliall not in this paper discuss the points of resemblance of 

 these hybrids to Oenothera Lamarckiana DE Veies, fui'thei' than to 

 state that certain plants appeared to have all of the essential taxonomic 

 characters of the small-flowered forms of Lamarckiana; they differed 

 in relatively small plus or minus expressions of certain peculiarities. 

 Another year fuither generations from some of these Fi hyl)rids will 



