Chap. III. LINUM GEANDIFLOEUM. 85 



flower-garden yielded seventeen long-styled and twelve 

 short-styled forms. These facts justify the statement 

 that the two forms are produced in about equal num- 

 bers. The thirty-four plants of the first lot were kept 

 under a net which excluded all insects, except such 

 minute ones as Thrips. I fertilised fourteen long-styled 

 flowers legitimately with pollen from the short-styled, 

 and got eleven fine seed-capsules, which contained on 

 an average 8'6 seeds per capsule, but only 5-6 appeared 

 to be good. It may be well to state that ten seeds is 

 the maximum production for a capsule, and that our 

 climate cannot be very favourable to this North- African 

 plant. On three occasions the stigmas of nearly a 

 hundred flowers were fertilised illegitimately with their 

 own-form pollen, taken from separate plants, so as to 

 prevent any possible ill effects from close inter-breed- 

 ing. Many other flowers were also produced, which, as 

 before stated, must have received plenty of their own 

 pollen ; yet from all these flowers, borne by the seven- 

 teen long-styled plants, only three capsules were pro- 

 duced. One of these included no seed, and the other 

 two together gave only five good seeds. It is probable 

 that this miserable product of two half-fertile capsules 

 from the seventeen plants, each of which must have 

 produced at least fifty or sixty flowers, resulted from 

 their fertilisation with pollen from the short-styled 

 plants by the aid of Thrips ; for I made a great 

 mistake in keeping the two forms under the same net, 

 with their branches often interlocking ; and it is sur- 

 prising that a greater number of flowers were not 

 accidentally fertilised. 



Twelve short-styled flowers were in this instance 

 castrated, and afterwards fertilised legitimately with 

 pollen from the long-styled form ; and they produced 

 seven fine capsules. These included on an average 



