SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE, NOVEMBEE 7. 



ccxvii 



agree with the figure given by Bauer. Mr. Eolfe recognized it as 

 0. crassifolia, a BraziUan species, described by Lindley, with whose 

 type specimen in the Kew Herbarium it agrees weU. 



Crosses ivith Piswn. — Mr. A. W. Sutton, V.M.H., gave an in- 

 teresting account of his experiments in crossing a Pea which he found 

 in Palestine in 1904 with forms of the cultivated Peas. The plant 

 found was a weak-stemmed plant, about three feet in height, and bear- 

 ing very small, blunt pods. It had no purple colour in the leaf -axils, 

 and was, therefore, supposed to be white-flowered (the plants being past 

 flowering), and seed was collected. The seed was olive-green, heavily 

 mottled with brown, varying to a dark brown. The seedlings raised 

 in England had serrated leaflets, self- (not bi-) coloured magenta flowers, 

 but no colour in the leaf- axils ; the pods were small and obtuse, and 

 curious in containing a white, woolly substance, similar to that con- 

 tained in the pods of Beans. It appeared to resemble, in some measure, 

 Pisuni quadratum, which he had obtained from Kew; but in that the 

 flowers are bicoloured, the leaflets entire, the seeds rounder, and not 

 so dark in colour. In addition to these two, the only pea with bi- 

 coloured flowers and no colour in the leaf-axils known to Mr. Sutton is 

 one obtained from Svalof, under the name ' Solvart.' With the idea 

 of discovering whether this wild form could be the ancestor of the 

 white-flowered culinary pea (Pisum sativum) or the bicoloured field 

 pea (P. arvense), which some consider varieties of one species, Mr. 

 Sutton made about forty crosses with various forms, but in only four 

 cases was it possible to grow the hybrids to Fa, or further, in two of 

 which one of the parents was a variety of P. sativum, and in two 

 varieties of P. arvense. In all the others sterility manifested itself, 

 and the varieties were lost ; but in the four crosses mentioned more or 

 less perfect fertility seems to have been achieved. The crosses were 

 made with the' sole idea of discovering the relationship the Palestine 

 pea had to commercial peas. Five crosses were made with round- 

 seeded, white-flowering varieties (P. sativum), and sterility prevented 

 them being grown to F2, similar results attending eight crosses made 

 with wrinkled-seeded, white-flowered peas. Six crosses with round- 

 seeded, white-flowered, umbellate peas (P. sativum umhellatum) gave 

 only one that has continued fertile. Five crosses made with the 

 degenerate types which constantly occur among cultivated varieties of 

 P. sativum gave only one which has continued fertile. Sixteen crosses 

 with bicoloured types (P. arvense) resulted in only two which have 

 continued fertile. The F^ hybrids were, as a rule, taller than the 

 Palestine pea, and had leaflets more or less serrated; the flowers were 

 bicoloured. In F2 plants with white flowers and entire leaflets 

 occurred, but none was found resembling the Palestine pea, but with 

 white flowers. It would thus appear that the pea occurring wild in 

 Palestine is not the plant from which the cultivated forms have been 

 derived. Mr. Sutton exhibited seeds of the wild form and of the culti- 

 vated ones with which it was crossed. It was unanimously resolved, 

 on the motion of Mr. Holmes, F.L.S., seconded by Mr. Bennett-Poe, 



