110 GOOD FROM CROSSING. Chap. XVII. 



Here follows the evidence of an English gardener: 50 "I have this 

 " summer met with better success in my cultivation of melons, in 

 " an unprotected state, from the seeds of hybrids (*.e. mongrels) 

 " obtained by cross impregnation, than with old varieties. The 

 " offspring of three different hybridisations (one more especially, of 

 " which the parents were the two most dissimilar varieties I could 

 " select) each yielded more ample and finer produce than any one 

 " of between twenty and thirty established varieties." 



Andrew Knight 51 believed that his seedlings from crossed varieties 

 of the apple exhibited increased vigour and luxuriance; and M. 

 Chevrenl 5 - alludes to the extreme vigour of some of the crossed 

 fruit-trees raised by Sageret. 



By crossing reciprocally the tallest and shortest peas, Knight 53 

 says : " I had in this experiment a striking instance of the 

 " stimulative effects of crossing the breeds; for the smallest variety, 

 " whose height rarely exceeded two feet, was increased to six feet : 

 " whilst the height of the large and luxuriant kind was very little 

 " diminished." Mr. Laxton gave me seed-peas produced from 

 sses between four distinct kinds; and the plants thus raised were 

 extraordinarily vigorous, being in each case from one to two or three 

 feet taller than the parent-forms growing close alongside them. 



Wiegmann 54 made many crosses t>etween several varieties of 

 cabbage; and he speaks with astonishment of the vigour and 

 height of the mongrels, which excited the amazement of all the 

 gardeners who beheld them. Mr. Chaundy raised a great number 

 of mongrels by planting together >ix distinct varieties of cabbage. 

 These mongrels displayed an infinite diversity of character; "But 

 " the most remarkable circumstance was, that, while all the other 

 " cabbages and borecoles in the nursery were d< stroyed by a severe 

 " winter, these hybrids were little injured. and supplied the kitchen 

 " when there was no other Cabbage to be had." 



Mr. Maund exhibited before the Royal Agricultural Society"'"' 

 i win at. together with their parent varieties ; 

 and the editor states that they were intermediate in character, 

 " united with that greater vigour of growth, which it appears, in 

 " the vegetable as in the animal world, is the result of a first cross." 

 Knight also crossed several varieties of wheat, 56 and he says " that 

 " in the years 1795 and 17'JG, when almost the whole crop of corn 

 " in the island was blighted, the varieties thus obtained, and these 

 " only, escaped in this neighbourhood, though sown in several 

 " different soils and situations."' 



** Loudon's ' Gard. Mag.,' vol. Yiii., 5i ' Uebei die Bastarderzeugung, 1 



». 52. 1828, - . For Mr. Chaundy'a 



51 • Transact. Hort. S^e.,' vol. i. p. ca^e. see Loudon's ' Gard. Mag.' vul. 



vii. 1831, | . 



«" 'AnnaL de< S . N :..' " -Gardener's Chron.,' 18iH, p 

 Bot., torn. vi. p. 1 1? 



53 'Philosophical Transactions' M ' Philosoph. Transact.,' 1 7f9, jr 



1799, p. 200. - 1. 



