Chap. V. HBTEROSTYLBD DIMORPHIC PLANTS. 213 



fertilised by the short-styled form, and from the latter 

 reciprocally fertilised by the long-styled; and these con- 

 sisted of 33 long-styled and 26 short-styled plants with not 

 one mid-styled form. There can, therefore, be no doubt 

 that the legitimate offspring from any two forms of Oxalis 

 tend to belong to the same two forms as their parents ; but 

 that a few seedlings belonging to the third form occasion- 

 ally make their appearence ; and this latter fact, as Hilde- 

 brand remarks, may be attributed to atavism, as some of 

 their progenitors will almost certainly have belonged to the 

 third form. 



When, however, any form of Oxalis is fertilised illegiti- 

 mately with pollen from the same form, the seedlings ap- 

 pear to belong invariably to this form. Thus Hildebrand 

 states * that long-styled plants of 0. rosea growing by 

 themselves have been propagated in Germany year after 

 year by seed, and have always produced long-styled plants. 

 Again, 17 seedlings were raised from mid-styled plants of 

 0. hedysaroides growing by themselves, and these were all 

 mid-styled. So that the forms of Oxalis, when illegiti- 

 mately fertilised with their own pollen, behave like the 

 long-styled form of Lythrum salicaria, which when thus 

 fertilised always produced with me long-styled offspring. 



Primula. 



Primula Sinensis. 



I raised during February, 1862, from some long- 

 styled plants illegitimately fertilised with pollen from 

 the same form, twenty-seven seedlings. The?e were 

 all long-styled. They proved fully fertile or even 

 fertile in excess ; fpr ten flowers, fertilised with pollen 

 from other plants of the same lot, yielded nine cap- 

 sules, containing on an average 39.75 seeds, with a 

 maximum in one capsule of 66 seeds. Four other 

 flowers legitimately crossed with pollen from a legiti- 



* 'UeberdenTrimorphismnsin Berlin.' 21st .Tune, 1866, p. 373; 

 der Gattung Oxalis : Monats- and ' Bot. Zeitang,' 1871, p. 435. 

 boriohte der Akad. der Wissen. zu 



