2^6 ON ■i'Ht" INlIERi rANCE OF THE FLOWERING TIME IN PEAS AND RICE 
III. ON THE GAIHETIC COUPLING BETWEEN 
FLOWERING TIME AND FLOWER COLOUR IN PEAS. 
Lock (1934 and 1905) noticed in his experiments with pea hybrids the 
correlation between white flowers and early flowering, red flowers and late 
flowering. Afterwards Tschermak (1910) saw the same correlation in his 
experiments. But neither tried to explain this correlation genetically. 
Throughout the present experiments we also have noticed this correlation. 
In all F2 families, there was excess of white-flowered to red-flowered indivi- 
duals in the early flowering group, but in the late flowering group, on the 
contrary, a very small number of white flowers was present (Tables 2 and 8). 
In variable families of F.j and raisings, the same phenomenon prevailed, 
except in a very few cases. We shall consider now whether this correlation 
may be interpreted on the hypothesis of gametic coupling or not. 
For the interpretation of the inheritance of the flowering time in peas, 
Ave proposed two alleromorphic pairs, a, A and b, B- If we assume that one 
character is determined by two Mendelian factors, our method of treatment 
must be different from that in the cases of gametic coupling hitherto investi- 
gated. We must consider at first, whether the flower colour couples exclusive- 
ly with either one of the two factors, or indej^endently with each of them, or 
whether the coupling takes place when two-factors are present together in 
the gametes. Studjang carefully the distribution of different coloured in- 
dividuals throughout the experimental results, we are quite convinced, that 
the latter two assumptions must be abandoned. By assuming that the factor 
for red colour couples with the more powerful factor A from the late parent, 
all the observed results can be adequately explained. We shall show in the 
following paragraphs the possibility of this interpretation. 
If we assume gametic cou[)ling between the factor for red colour and the 
factor A for flowering time on the 7 : i basis, we should expect a distribution 
of whites and reds in the two flowering groups of F2 families as follows : — 
