CROSSED AND SELF-FERTILISED PLANTS OF THE SECOND GENERATION.
The crossed and self-fertilised seeds from the crossed and self-fertilised plants of the last generation were sown on opposite sides of two pots; but the seedlings were not thinned enough, so that both lots grew very irregularly, and most of the self-fertilised plants after a time died from being smothered. My measurements were, therefore, very incomplete. From the first the crossed seedlings appeared the finest, and when they were on an average, by estimation, 5 inches high, the self-fertilised plants were only 4 inches. In both pots the crossed plants flowered first. The two tallest flower-stems on the crossed plants in the two pots were 17 and 16 1/2 inches in height; and the two tallest flower-stems on the self-fertilised plants 10 1/2 and 9 inches; so that their heights were as 100 to 58. But this ratio, deduced from only two pairs, obviously is not in the least trustworthy, and would not have been given had it not been otherwise supported. I state in my notes that the crossed plants were very much more luxuriant than their opponents, and seemed to be twice as bulky. This latter estimate may be believed from the ascertained weights of the two lots in the next generation. Some flowers on these crossed plants were again crossed with pollen from another plant of the same lot, and some flowers on the self-fertilised plants again self-fertilised; and from the seeds thus obtained the plants of the next generation were raised.