On a New Character in Leptospermum scoparium. 45 
colour to that of the species, being much darker, brownish in fact, 
and not green. A branch was sent to Messrs. Nairn & Son by the 
discoverer of the plant, so that they could increase the form by 
means of cuttings. However, the wood was too hard and the 
cuttings would not strike. But happily there was abundance of 
capsules full of ripe seeds and these were sown, with the result 
that some hundreds of seedlings appeared in due course. Not¬ 
withstanding the fact that the seed must most certainly have been 
in large measure the result of cross-fertilization, about six plants 
appeared which produced crimson flowers, one of which almost 
exactly matched the parent-plant. As for the remainder of the 
seedlings there were all gradations from the normal white of the 
species by way of pinks up to the new colour, the crimson. As for 
these latter, it was possible to pick them out with certainty when 
in the early seedling stage, merely from the darker colour of the 
foliage. Although Messrs. Nairn & Son destroyed a good many of 
the seedlings, while others have not bloomed up to the time of 
writing this, at the present time an excellent idea of their 
variability can be gathered. The variable characters are :—colour 
of flowers, arrangement of flowers ( i.e ., whether they are terminal 
on short reduced branches, or whether these branches are so much 
reduced as to make the flowers appear axillary), size of leaves 
and colour of leaves. The darkest crimson form is quite distinct 
from the bright rose-coloured Leptospermum Chapmanni, not only 
in the colour of the flowers, but in the general habit of the plant, 
it being much more drooping and slender. Its flowers also are 
apparently axillary and not terminal. 
The other seedlings vary much in size of flowers as well as in 
colour, but it would serve no purpose here to give exact details. 
If we bear in mind that cross-fertilization must have played a 
large part in the above variability, then it may be assumed that 
in all probability this crimson Leptospermum would, if fertilized with 
its own pollen alone, yield a considerable proportion of individuals 
differing but little from the parent. In other words, it seems to 
me, that we have here, and also in the case of Leptospermwn 
Chapmanni, a new character come into being at one jump, aud 
these plants, if not mutants, are at any rate “ ever-sporting 
varieties.” That such a break is hinted at in the systematic 
species, Leptospermum scoparium, is plain enough from the 
occasional pink forms and the race with pinkish flowers of the 
north of New Zealand. It may be that the species has in it, 
latent, both the white and the crimson character, the latter only 
