46 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



no means rare to find tubers growing aerially instead of below the 

 ground. I have not, however, met with records of Tropaeolum flowers 

 with three and four spurs. I may remind you that when Linaria 

 vulgaris was first found in 1742 with five spurs, the variation was 

 thought so marvellous that the word " peloria " (miracle) was intro- 

 duced into botany to express it. None of the specimens you have 

 seen to-day may be new, but the essence of these experiments lies in 

 the fact that we now know what can give rise to such variations, 

 and we can reproduce them at will by means of natural forces and 

 phenomena. 



