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Aw Atrempr aT CLASSIFICATION. 
We have endeavored to classify the varieties of pea thus far tested 
at the Station. We present the result of our work with some hesi- 
tation through uncertainty whether certain characters delineated are 
sufficiently fixed to apply for all soils and climates. We have been 
unable to find many characters that may be considered constant. 
When it is remembered that the pods and the height of the plant 
are almost the only characters that have been made the object of 
selection, we should hardly except to find constancy in other parts 
except as correlated with these. We have noted that some characters 
employed by other authors in describing the pea are by no means 
constant, and we shall not be surprised if some that we have used 
will prove equally unreliable. We offer our scheme as the best 
that we are able to devise with our present knowledge. R 
Botanical Relations. 
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The pea belongs to the natural order Lrcumiosa, sub-order ~ 
Papitionaces”, tribe Vicrm, and genus Pisum. 
The plant is a herbaceous annual with smooth, more or less 
glaucous foliage, abruptly pinnate leaves, the common rhachis ter- 
minating in a branching tendril, and the base of the petioles clasped 
with foliaceous stipules larger than the leaflets ; slender hollow stems, 
branching, deeply extending tap roots, axillary papilionaceous flowers, 
borne one, two, rarely three to the peduncle, giving place to more 
or less fleshy pods, containing two to eleven smooth or shrivelled 
seeds. : 
Agricultural Classification. 
Three agricultural species may be recognized as follows : 
Ist. Pisum * satwwwm, the common garden pea; characterized 
by white or bluish white flowers, followed by pods having a thin, but 
tenacious lining which gives them firmness and which by contraction 
in drying causes them to open at their sutures, the halves bending 
ina spiral. The seeds are used both immature and ripe as table 
esculents. 
2d. P.* macrocarpon, the edible podded peat (the sans parchemin 
of the French) ; characterized by its pods being without the parch- 
ment like lining of P* sutewwuwm and P * arvense, and which do not 
self open at maturity, The absence of this membrane renders the 
pods tender and succulent while immature, hence they may be 
cooked and eaten with the partially grown peas after the manner of 
“string beans.” The seeds are also used like those of P * satzvwm. 
+The name ‘‘ sugar pea,’ commonly applied to the varieties of this agricul- 
tural species, is very inappropriate, since these peas really contain less sugar 
than do those of P * sativum. 
