As the parent-plant
growing in Edinburgh was found by Mr. Scott to be in a high degree sterile, it
may have transmitted a similar tendency to its offspring, independently of their
illegitimate birth. I am, however, inclined to attribute some weight to the
illegitimacy of their descent, both from the analogy of other cases, and more
especially from the fact that when the plants were LEGITIMATELY fertilised with
pollen of the common primrose they yielded an average, as may be seen in the
table, of only 5 more seeds than when ILLEGITIMATELY fertilised with the same
pollen. Now we know that it is eminently characteristic of the illegitimate
offspring of Primula Sinensis that they yield but few more seeds when
legitimately fertilised than when fertilised with their own-form pollen.
Primula veris, Brit. Fl.
Var. officinalis of Linn., P. officinalis OF Jacq.
Seeds from the short-styled form of the cowslip fertilised with pollen from the
same form germinate so badly that I raised from three successive sowings only
fourteen plants, which consisted of nine short-styled and five long-styled
plants. Hence the short-styled form of the cowslip, when self-fertilised, does
not transmit the same form nearly so truly as does that of P. Sinensis. From the
long-styled form, always fertilised with its own-form pollen, I raised in the
first generation three long-styled plants,--from their seed 53 long-styled
grandchildren,--from their seed 4 long-styled great-grandchildren,--from their
seed 20 long-styled great-great-grandchildren,--and lastly, from their seed 8
long-styled and 2 short-styled great-great-great-grandchildren.
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