ON THE HYBRIDATION OF PLANTS. 
19 
so-called garden hybrids which are annually produced are merely either “ sports ” of one and the same 
variable nature, or seedlings from hybrids. Of the latter I shall speak presently. As examples of the 
former, falsely called hybrid forms, I need only refer to the countless varieties of fruit trees and garden 
vegetables, to Dahlias, China Asters, &c., &c. In reference to artificial fertilization, I may add that 
it will only be successful when the plants operated upon are removed from all others of the same 
species blowing at the same time, and the flowers to be fertilized opened shortly before their natural 
expansion for the removal of their stamens ; then, as soon as the stigma is seen to be ripe for fertilization, 
the pollen of another plant is applied to it. To make the fertilization “ take ” more readily, I usually 
cut the plants pretty closely, remove all the flowers, except a few which are to be fertilized, and break 
off all new shoots from the branch, or even from the whole plant, until the seed is ripe, so as to concen¬ 
trate the vegetative force of the plant wholly upon the maturation of the seed. 
2. The fertilization by strange pollen takes place the more readily in proportion to the proximity 
of the species which are crossed. The production of hybrids between even any closely allied genera is 
extremely rare. 
Observation. —This fact is universally received. I have only succeeded once in raising a hybrid be¬ 
tween two genera,* namely, between Trevirania grandijlora and Diastema gracilis. I called this hybrid 
Diastema Jtinzii. It possessed the stamens, style, and the structure of the male parent; and in refer¬ 
ence to the colour of the blossoms, the leaves, &c., it stood intermediately. Again, the degree of facility 
with which the cross-fertilization takes place, even between any nearly allied species of the same genus 
is widely different in different genera. In some genera these experiments never succeed, in others only 
when extreme precautions are taken ( Gesneracece ), in others, again, comparatively readily ( Begoniece , 
Calceolariece, Fuchsieee, &c.), and some even without any artificial aid ( Cuphece). Forms of one and 
the same species merely require to be placed side by side, and not artificially fertilized, for these take 
the pollen of each other as readily as they do their own. 
3. Artificial hybrids are often infertile, but still they frequently bear seed. 
Observation. —Botanists commonly assume that hybrids are barren. But this is only the case to a 
certain degree, inasmuch that the hybrid seldom bears seed in the first year, even when it is artificially 
fertilized. At least, so it happened with me in many cases, in the earlier years; but I was afterwards 
able to obtain a sufficient quantity of seed from the same hybrids. It seems as if the weather had also 
a good deal to do with this. I may mention, as an example, the hybrid between Cytisus Laburnum 
and Cytisus purpureus, which formerly blossomed every year in our garden, but never bore seed, while 
in recent years it has spontaneously “ set ” a quantity of fruits and matured them.-j* 
4. It is a general rule with hybrids that they most resemble the male parent in the flowers, while 
the foliage and habit take after the mother plant. But exceptions to this general rule often occur, in¬ 
somuch that sometimes one, sometimes the other, parent exhibits a preponderating influence ; but the 
seedlings derived from one and the same fertilization, even when there are thousands of them, always 
present exactly the same characters. 
Observation. —I formerly believed that various forms might arise from one and the same fertiliza¬ 
tion ; but this was an error originating from the employment of different varieties for the fertilizations. 
Distinctions which sometimes show themselves at first in true hybrids, in regard to the colour of the 
flower, &c., disappear in the succeeding years. 
5. Seedlings of hybrids mostly differ very much from each other. 
Observation. —As soon as the path is opened, as it were, by obtaining a few true hybrids in a genus, 
and these hybrids can be brought to ripen seed, then commences an infinite series of forms, or in other 
words, in the eye of the botanist, an interminable confusion ; for the seedlings of the hybrids mostly 
differ more or less from each other, since they return, in varying degrees, towards original species. I 
* The “ genera” mentioned are so closely allied as to have been formerly included under Achimenes.— M. 
+ Examples of this hybrid, which we have seen in this country, are barren while young, the flowers being of the true inter¬ 
mediate character. But as the trees grow older, the two species seem to separate from each other, and each to claim a portion of 
the buds, so that we see flowers of each parent, together with the hybrid’s blossoms, all on the tree at once. In such cases onlythe 
“pure ” blossoms ripen seed, that of the “ cross” being always barren.—A. H. 
