(2/15.
Babington 'Manual of British Botany' 1851 page 258.) The capsules when mature
differ conspicuously, owing to their length, from those of the cowslip and
primrose. With respect to the fertility of the two forms when these are united
in the four possible methods, they behave like the other heterostyled species of
the genus, but differ somewhat (see Tables 1.8 and 1.12.) in the smaller
proportion of the illegitimately fertilised flowers which set capsules. That P.
elatior is not a hybrid is certain, for when the two forms were legitimately
united they yielded the large average of 47.1 seeds, and when illegitimately
united 35.5 per capsule; whereas, of the four possible unions (Table 2.14)
between the two forms of the common oxlip which we know to be a hybrid, one
alone yielded any seed; and in this case the average number was only 11.6 per
capsule. Moreover I could not detect a single bad pollen-grain in the anthers of
the short-styled P. elatior; whilst in two short-styled plants of the common
oxlip all the grains were bad, as were a large majority in a third plant. As the
common oxlip is a hybrid between the primrose and cowslip, it is not surprising
that eight long-styled flowers of the primrose, fertilised by pollen from the
long-styled common oxlip, produced eight capsules (Table 1.18), containing,
however, only a low average of seeds; whilst the same number of flowers of the
primrose, similarly fertilised by the long-styled Bardfield oxlip, produced only
a single capsule; this latter plant being an altogether distinct species from
the primrose.
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