MULTIPLE PARENTAGE 41 
ing at all, to yield very diverse progeny, displaying several charac- 
ters in an erratic fashion, which might be imputed to other 
varieties sown in conjunction. To take a concrete case, in Ex- 
periment No. 6, page 84, “ the spores of eight varieties were mixed 
and sown together. These were multifidum (crested), Victoria 
(cruciate), uncum (lax), Frizelle (lunulate), truncatum. (truncate), 
proteoides (a cruciate with projecting pinna), crucipinnulum 
(cruciate in the pinnules), and ramosum (branched). Now, in 
point of fact, “ proteoides,” as its very name implies, would, 
per se, produce offspring of precisely the character depicted on 
pages 85 and 86, which are claimed to show the characters of seven 
out of the eight varieties shown, and thus to demonstrate their 
multiple parentage, that is, that seven half sperm cells had con- 
trived to combine with one half ovarial cell, a biological im- 
possibility. In point of fact, instead of seven combined characters 
there are only signs of two in the truncate form, and of “ pro- 
teoides ” alone in the other, while the crested characters of multi- 
fidum and Victoria, the branched character of “ ramosum,” and 
the ball-like pinnae of “ Frizelliæ ” are entirely absent. We have 
taken this instance as a typical one of many. Turning now to the 
extraordinary combinations Mr. Lowe produced in the Harts- 
tongues, he sowed undulatum (а wavy fronded Fern), spirale (а 
dwarf variety with a spirally twisted apex), muricatum (a muricate 
form), and keratoides (a branching, crested form), and he claims 
that four resulting plants, depicted by him, one of which is named 
** quadriparens," showed unmistakably the influence of four parents, 
but here “ undulatum” and “ spirale” are closely akin, the latter 
a dwarf form of the former, and the great vitiating factor in all 
such experiments is lost sight of, viz. that once a Fern has departed 
from the normal, its progeny may vary greatly without any crossing, 
and may even spontaneously produce crests, as has occurred over 
and over again. Another point is that if such crossing experiments 
be continued for years under glass it is practically an impossibility 
to make pure sowings, and a few strange spores may produce plants 
which lead to entirely mistaken conclusions, since they may already 
be the result of a cross, and, becoming crossed again, produce four 
combined characters, instead of two. It is, however, rather the 
fundamental simplicity of the fertilizing process which we have 
described, upon which we rely as controverting the theory of 
multiple parentage, and we put it forward here merely that the 
opposing views should be grasped by fern-growers, and not in the 
very least as detracting from the great services which Mr. Lowe 
rendered in connection with our native Ferns by his publications 
and experimental work, since it was indubitably he who first con- 
vinced scientific botanists that hybridization was possible. А 
secondary object is to point out to students and experimentalists 
in this line of research that it is unwise to sow mixtures of spores 













