striped Flowers 331 



full size. Absolute sterility is the natural con- 

 sequence of this state of things. 



Hence it is impossible to have races of petal- 

 omanous types. If the abnormality happens to 

 show itself in a species, which normally prop- 

 agates itself in an asexual way, the type may 

 become a vegetative variety, and be multiplied 

 by bulbs, buds or cuttings, etc. Some cultivated 

 anemones and crowfoots (Ranunculus) are of 

 this character, and even the marsh-marigold 

 (Caltha palustris) has a petalomanous variety. 

 I once found in a meadow such a form of the 

 meadow-buttercup (Ranunculus acris), and suc- 

 ceeded in keeping it in my garden for several 

 years, but it did not make seeds and finally 

 died. Camellias are known to have both types 

 of double flowers. The petalomanous type is 

 highly regular in structure, so much so as to be 

 too uniform in all its parts to be pleasing, while 

 the conversion of stamens into petals in the al- 

 ternative varieties gives to these flowers a more 

 lively diversity of structure. Lilies have a va- 

 riety called Lilium candidum flore plena, in 

 which the flowers seem to be converted into 

 a long spike of bright, white narrow bracts, 

 crowded on an axis which never seems to cease 

 their production. 



It is manifestly impossible to decide how all 

 such sterile double flowers have originated. 



