So that, by all these standards of comparison, the short-styled form is the more fertile; if we take the number of umbels (which is the fairest standard, for large and small plants are thus equalised), the short-styled plants produce more seed than the long-styled, in the proportion of nearly four to three.
In 1861 the trial was made in a fuller and fairer manner. A number of wild plants had been transplanted during the previous autumn into a large bed in my garden, and all were treated alike; the result was:—
TABLE 1.3.
Column 1: Plant. Column 2: Number of Plants. Column 3: Number of Umbels. Column 4: Weight of Seed in grains.
Short-styled cowslips : 47 : 173 : 745. Long-styled cowslips : 58 : 208 : 692.
These figures give us the following proportions:—
TABLE 1.4.
Column 1: Plant. Column 2: Number of Plants. Column 3: Weight of Seed in grains. ... Column 4: Number of Umbels. Column 5: Weight of Seed in grains.
Short-styled cowslips : 100 : 1585 :: 100 : 430. Long-styled cowslips : 100 : 1093 :: 100 : 332.
The season was much more favourable this year than the last; the plants also now grew in good soil, instead of in a shady wood or struggling with other plants in the open field; consequently the actual produce of seed was considerably larger. Nevertheless we have the same relative result; for the short-styled plants produced more seed than the long-styled in nearly the proportion of three to two; but if we take the fairest standard of comparison, namely, the product of seeds from an equal number of umbels, the excess is, as in the former case, nearly as four to three.