18 



Miss E. R. Saunders. On a Discontinuous 



Tliese numbers are not of value as indicating the relative proportion 

 of the different types occurring in the particular locality from which 

 the seeds were obtained ; for in the first place a certain selection 

 was intentionally employed in their collection, and secondly it 

 happened that the majority of the seventy-two plants which were not 

 included in Table I, for the reasons previously stated, belonged to 

 types II (surface intermediate) and III (surface smooth), con- 

 sequently the proportion of hairy individuals appears to be much 

 larger than it actually was. As a matter of fact it is practically im- 

 possible to determine the numerical ratio of the different types in 

 their natural habitat, owing to the characteristic habit previously 

 mentioned of producing accessory crowns of leaves on runners or 

 suckers j a habit which renders actual removal from the soil the only 

 method by which it is possible to ascertain the limits of the "in- 

 dividual." 



Of the 208 plants seventy-six were obtained from seeds gathered 

 from two very hairy individuals (A and B) ; the character of the 

 male parents was unknown, since these two plants like all the others 

 from which seeds were collected had been naturally and therefore 

 possibly promiscuously fertilised. The character of these seventy- 

 six plants is shown in Table II. 



Table II. 



Analysis of 76 of the 208 Plants included in Table I, being tlie Offspring 

 of two Hairy Plants, A and B. 



No. of Offspring. Surface Hairy. Surface Intermediate. Surface Smooth. 



Plant A 44 39 5 



Plant B 32 22 8 2 



Totals 76 61 13 2 



A more detailed analysis of these 208 plants was made in the 

 autumn of 1896, by which time the leaf character had apparently 

 become constant in all those individuals which as seedlings had 

 shown a tendency to assume a more glabrous habit ; the results are 

 recorded in the following tables : — 



Table III. 



Detailed Analysis of the 127 Plants bearing Leaves with a Hairy 



Surface. 



Analysis. 



/■ ~ ^ 



Time of No. of Plants dead or with 



sowing. plants. leaves withered or too No. of plants No. of plants -which 



small for identification. unchanged. had varied. 



August 35 11 22 2 



February.. 27 7 20 



March .... 65 10 55 



Totals . . 127 28 97 2 



