SEMINAL OR SEEDLING VARIETIES 31 1 



ordinarily yellow a single individual is observed whose flowers 

 have a very faint tinge of red, it is often possible to raise and fix 

 a distinctly red variety by selecting from each succeeding genera- 

 tion the plant in which the redness of petals is most marked. 

 Not only can the tints of flowers be modified and increased, 

 but almost all other characters, however they may appear at first 

 in the selected plant, may be increased in a similar manner. 



In 1890 E. v. Proskowetz sowed in good garden soil seeds of 

 the wild sea-beet obtained from specimens growing on the south 

 coast of France. All the seedlings had much branched roots 

 like their wild parents, and sent up flowering shoots the same 

 year in which the seeds were sown : the average sugar-content 

 was low although it exhibited wide variation, namely, between 

 o'3 and 11 '2 per cent. 



The plants of this generation, with good sugar-content and 

 with the least-branched and thickest roots were selected and 

 their seeds sown. The majority of the plants of this selected 

 second generation resembled their parents, but some of them 

 behaved as biennials and sent up no flowering stems in the first 

 year of their growth. 



From these biennial forms a further choice was made and 

 their seed sown ; in consequence of the selection and good 

 culture, the roots in 1893 had an average sugar-content of iS"93 

 per cent, and each had an average weight of 426 grams. In 

 another series of selected plants the average sugar-content in 

 1894 was i6'99 per cent, and the average weight of a root 368 

 grams. Although the seeds of these plants still gave rise to a 

 few annual plants resembling the original wild parents most of 

 the seedlings proved to be biennials, and in form of root and 

 amount of sugar greatly resembled some of the ordinary culti- 

 vated races of sugar-beet. 



In order to determine to some extent how much of the 

 increased sugar-content and size of the root was due to the better 

 garden soil in which the plants were raised, and how much due 



