160 On the Species of the Genus Primula in Essex.
were 1. Obs. Nos. 23, 26, 29, 30, 81, 32, and 34 all point
more or less clearly in the same direction. In opposition,
however, to these examples I wish to refer to Obs. 9, in
which (the wood being fully grown up) no stimulation could
have come into play, and to Obs. 18, in which the flowers
were noted as being small and going off; yet in these cases
the s. stood to the 1. in the proportions respectively of 47 and
51 to 100. Nevertheless it is certain that, in this species at
least, the long-styled plants have, when stimulated, a far
greater tendency than the short-styled ones to develop large
umbels—often abnormally so,—and this observation may
hereafter be found to be of some importance.
Turning now to Table III. we see that, of 4276 Cowslip
plants examined on twenty-nine different occasions in various
localities in Essex between March 29th, 1882, and April 24th,
1883, 2125 were short-, 2142 long-, and about 10 equal-styled,
thus giving the 1. a majority of 17. On eight of these
occasions, however, the s. had an aggregate majority of 141
out of 1650 plants, the relative proportion between the two
forms ranging in these cases between 233 and 110 as com-
pared with 100 ; whilst on the remaining nineteen occasions
(two being exactly equal) the 1. had an aggregate majority of
158 out of 2626 plants, the relative proportions of the two
forms ranging in these cases between 54 and 99 (omitting
Obs. 18 as unreliable) as compared with 100. On one
occasion (No. 18) when the flowers were withering, the 1.
actually outnumbered the s. in the proportion of 100 to 19,
but the plants examined were too few in number to afford
reliable results. I only give such observations that there
may not be the slightest suspicion of my having "cooked"
my figures by suppressing anything. Ou two occasions
(Nos. 2 and 24) the two forms were exactly equal in number.
Taking, however, the whole of the twenty-nine cases together
we shall see that the average proportion in which the s. stand
to the 1. is as 99.2 compared with 100. The foregoing remarks
show that in the Cowslip the relative proportion by which
the 1. outnumber the s. is not nearly so great nor so
regular as in the case of the Oxlip ; and is rather less than