HORTICULTURAL JOURNAL. 67 



given variety of the Petunia the corolla will be more apt to expandbe fore the 

 perfection of pollen when the plant receives the highest culture, so that the 

 farther we digress from the normal condition of the plant the greater the 

 facility of accidental production of new varieties. This we see proved in 

 many instances^ where after the production .of one or two new varieties a 

 whole flood of changes is poured in upon us in a short time. In nearly every 

 class of the multiplying varieties of florist's flowers of the present day, no 

 credit attaches to the originators of new varieties, except that of industry, 

 patience and opportunity. Verbenas, geraniums, etc., are planted in patches, 

 and seeds are collected and sown at a venture and the few out of hundreds 

 are saved as the result of chance fertilization. The facility of self-produc- 

 tion of new varieties after one digression I have seen beautifully exemplified 

 in the Portulacca. We had for many years the crimson, the scarlet, the yel- 

 low and the white, all well pronounced varieties, which for several years 

 stubbornly resisted the efforts to cross by artificial means. 



Four years since I obtained a cross between the crimson and yellow, and 

 got but one such plant from experiments upon several hundred flowers. It 

 was a beautifully marked variety, bearing a yellow flower with crimson bands 

 and stripes, and no sooner was this variety bedded with the normal kinds than 

 varieties began to multiply without help. The barrier was broken down and 

 nature ran wild, and without the interference of art, I now count from twenty 

 to thirty varieties of Portulacca. The Petunia is less accomodating ; pro- 

 miscuous planting and hap-hazard collecting and sowing at a venture, has 

 produced probably some hundreds of varieties, but not sufficiently pronounced 

 to demand separate names. One reason is, that with the Petunia the pollen 

 will often shed before the corolla opens and self impregnation excludes super- 

 foetation from other flowers. In this case W3 must force open the flower and 

 take off the anthers before the pollen sheds, and apply other pollen immedi- 

 ately, or wait until the germ is in the conceiving condition.* Petunias out 

 of doors or in the open ground shed the pollen earlier than those under cover. 

 Fortunately however I have several good varieties which expand the corolla 

 long before the pollen opens, and the whole operation of fertilizing is reduced 

 to the utmost simplicity. The anthers, five in number, are removed with small 

 forceps and the pollen of other flowers applied to the stigma by means of a 

 fine camel's hairbrush, either immediately or whenever the pollen will adhere* 

 \\ ith these prefatory remarks we come now to the chief point of this com- 

 munication. When cross-fecundation has been effected, as soon as the corolla 

 and style wither, the seed vessel is observed to swell more or less according 



*It needs to be mentioned that experiments upon cross-fecundation should 

 always if possible be conducted under cover. 



