ON DAISIES 



wild flowers to show that color variation is by no 

 means exceptional, but is, on the other hand, quite 

 the rule here, even as among cultivated species. 

 With a wild species, to be sure, there is usually 

 preponderance of one color or another, because 

 natural selection tends constantly to fix or accen- 

 tuate one character and to minimize or eliminate 

 another. In some respects the guide marks on the 

 flower seem as important as the color itself. 



But that even under natural conditions it may 

 not make a vast difference to the plant whether 

 its advertising floral envelope, to attract the atten- 

 tion of insects, is of one color or another, is sug- 

 gested by the frequency with which we find plants 

 of the same species putting forth flowers widely 

 different in hue. 



Let me cite a few instances, taken quite at 

 random. They will suggest the extent to which 

 one color may do service for another in the same 

 species; suggesting also the probability that hered- 

 itary factors for all the colors manifested by dif- 

 ferent specimens of a species are well represented, 

 at least in a latent condition, in the germ plasm 

 of all specimens of the species. 



The nemophila, a common wild plant in Cali- 

 foi'nia, has flowers that are generally clear, pure, 

 skyblue, but this varies in different localities 

 through all shades to snow white. Pink varieties 



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