NOTES AND ABSTEACTS. 



525 



cannot be called dry. No plant ever dies from being too dry, but many 

 suffer from being too wet, and others live but a short time. Such plants 

 as Thistles and Cistus die promptly. Irises never flower, although they 

 exist. Agaves and Cactaceous plants, again, grow splendidly and attain 

 enormous sizes. Eschscholzias, Zinnias, and Dahlias once sown become 

 simply weeds. Cytisus Laburnum and Paulownia imperialis only grow if 

 sheltered from rain by roofing. Some Palms exist only, some grow better, 

 but rarely bear fruit. Strawberries grow and fruit fairly well, especially 

 when roofed over. Violets (Viola odorata) grow and flower uninterruptedly 

 the whole year round. Tulips and Daffodils never flower, but they grow 

 tremendously and have an abundance of foliage. Olea and Syringa vulgaris 

 forms (Lilacs) never flower. Many plants from the dry Australian 

 regions, such as some of the Acacias, grow most luxuriantly and flower and 

 seed. Papaver nudicaule, from the Arctic zone, flowers from one end of 

 the year till the other. — G. B. 



Brooms for the Rock Garden. By W. D. (Garden, May 8, 1909, 

 p. 226). — Dwarf varieties, Cytisus keioensis (fig. p. 228), C. Beanii, 

 C. Ardoinei, C. purpureus, C. procumbens, G. versicolor and Genista 

 hispanica, G. pilosa, G. sagittalis, and G. tinctoria fl. pi. are suggested, 

 and methods of treatment are given. — H. B. D. 



Budsports and Teratology. By R. G. Leavitt (Bot. Gaz. vol. 



xlvii. (1909), No. 1, pp. 30-68, with 19 figs.).— The author after first 

 characterizing teratology as " a descriptive cult without unifying 

 principles, heretofore pursued chiefly by the vaguely curious, and lending 

 itself discreditably with equal readiness to either side of many a 

 morphological discussion in the past," proceeds to show that many of 

 its facts are of "special and high value." 



The paper deals with the many cases of the transference of characters 

 which normally belong to one stage in development or to one part of the 

 plant into a quite different stage or different part of it. 



Thus, for example, the leaflet scars of the Horse-chestnut are precisely 

 similar to the leaf-scar at the base of the petiole (see the well-known 

 illustration in Kerner's " Natural History "). The pinnae of the " Pierson 

 Fern " resemble in shape and in circinnate vernation the front of the 

 "Boston Fern," of which it is a sport, and the pinnpg of the " Whitman 

 Fern" is also very like the front of the Pierson fern (of which it is the 

 budsport of a sport). Many similar cases are described from the genus 

 Polystichum, &c. Many other examples are given, such as the three- 

 spurred form of Platanthera viridis ; aeropetal changes, such as the corolla 

 fringe of Gentiana crinita being transferred to the summit of the carpels ; 

 and basipetal transference, as when petaloid and sepaloid characters 

 appear on the foliage. The stigmata of certain Crocus hybrids, for 

 instance, may be found upon the apices of some of the leaves. 



Transference of this kind may affect organs which are not homologous, 

 for ovules may be replaced by a foliage leaf or a droseraceous tentacle ; 

 apogamous prothallia may also imitate the sporophyte directly, showing 

 that such transference is not confined to one alternating generation. 



Such transference or homoeotic metamorphosis is often determined 



