TWO TYPES OF VARIABLE PUBESCENCE IN PLANTS 47 1 
pubescence with age and that leaves of other plants have one form of 
pubescence in the spring succeeded by a somewhat different kind of 
pubescence at maturity, but I do not know of attention having been 
called to any having glabrous leaves, and leaves with one and some 
with two forms of pubescence on a single individual at the same time. 
During the latter part of 191 3 there was received for study, through 
the Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction and Distribution, 
about thirty sheets of Chinese chestnuts (Castanea) collected by Mr. 
Frank N. Meyer in the province of Chi-li. They were accompanied 
by a lot of burs which were collected on a different date than any of 
the specimens, which were from two or three localities, so there was 
no reason to suspect that all belonged to the same species, especially 
as the leaves presented noticeable variations in size, pubescence, and 
dentation. Tentatively these were divided into three species and an 
unsuccessful attempt made to locate them among those previously 
described ; but the absence of inflorescence and definite knowledge as 
to which of the specimens, if any, the burs were to be associated with, 
prevented any positive identifications. As the seed with this material 
was sent for propagation, with the expectation that it would prove 
resistant to the Chestnut Blight, Messrs. J. Franklin CoUins and R. 
Kent Beattie, who were investigating this disease, went over the 
material and verified my tentative conclusions. Later, photographs 
of types from European herbaria and all of the Chinese Castanea from 
the Arnold Arboretum having been obtained, the material was again 
gone over with Messrs. Collins and Beattie without very satisfactory 
results, but with the firm conviction that three or more species were 
represented. 
Learning from Mr. Collins that two trees propagated from the 
seed received were growing upon Mr. David Fairchild's place at North 
Chevy Chase, Md., where they had been inoculated the previous 
season, a joint inspection of the trees was arranged and all of the 
available type photographs and herbarium material taken along for 
comparison, with the following results. 
I. Practically every form and size of leaf and variation in pubes- 
cence and dentation represented in the photographs of type material 
of Castanea mollissima Blume from the Paris and Leyden herbaria, 
and in the herbarium material from northern China, were found on 
the two trees which were grown from the same lot of seed. Further- 
more the seeds from which the two trees grew probably were produced 
on the same tree in China. 
