Io THE ORCHID “REVIEW. [JANUARY, I913- 
the characters of O. crispum and QO. luteopurpureum can be traced in it. 
Thus four species are concerned in the ancestry of O. percultum, O. 
Pescatorei—which comes in through both the parents—O. Harryanum, O. 
crispum, and QO. luteopurpureum. The characters of the hybrids are fairly 
in accordance, for the influence of O. Pescatorei is very marked in figs. z, 4, 
and 12, and less distinctly so in 5, 11, and 13, while that of O. Harryanum 
is obvious enough in 3,6, and 10. There is a marked resemblance to O. 
Rolfez in figs. 11 and 13, and less so in 2 and 5, while O. armainvillierense 
can be traced in £ and 4, especially the latter. The only flower in which 
the character of O. c. Franz Masereel is very marked is fig. 9. The 
characters of O. crispum and O. luteopurpureum, especially the latter, are 
less clearly traced, but the figures are too small for all of them to be very 
distinct. | Most of the forms shown are very handsome, and when fully 
developed may be distinguished by varietal names. Such a batch affords a 
very graphic insight into what must take place in nature where crossing 
by insects is common, as in the O. crispum district, for example, 
and also the impossibility of tracing the ancestry of such complex hybrid 
forms by their characters alone. It once more emphasises the importance 
of keeping exact records. In conclusion we would ask some of our 
hybridists to self-fertilise O. crispum Franz Masereel. Some good forms 
would almost certainly result, while the forms which reverted would afford 
a valuable clue to its ancestry. We do not remember that such an 
experiment has been made. 
5 agemee 
A DEFINITION OF MENDELISM.—‘ As I understand Mendelism it is a 
concept pure and simple. One crosses various animals or plants and 
records the results. . . . We push things into the germ cells as we place 
the dollars in the magician’s hat. Hocuspocus! They disappear! Presto ! 
Out they come again! If we have marked our money we may find that 
that which appears from the magician’s false-bottomed hat is not the same as 
that which we putin. But it looks the same, and is good coin of the realm. 
We have a good right, therefore, to poke our characters into the germ cell 
and to pull them out again if by so-doing we can develop—not a true 
conception of the mechanism of heredity—but a scheme that aids in 
describing an inheritance. Wemaydothis even ... ifwe remember. . . 
that we have not pulled something new and astonishing out of the germ 
cell, that a unit-factor represents an idea and not a reality, though it must 
have a broad base of reality if it is to describe a series of genetic facts.”— 
Frof. E. M. Easr. 
[We have always contended that unit-characters were imaginary things, 
having no actual existence, and the confirmation from such a source is 
valuable.—Ep.] . 
