This curious remainder of the original, symmetrical structure of
the flower seems to have been overlooked hitherto by the investigators
of peloric toad-flaxes.
The peloric variety of this plant is characterized by its producing only
peloric flowers. No single bilabiate or one-spurred flower remains.
[466] I once had a lot of nearly a hundred specimens of this fine
variety, and it was a most curious and beautiful sight to observe the
many thousands of nearly regular flowers blooming at the same time. Some
degree of variability was of course present, even in a large measure.
The number of the spurs varied between four and six, transgressing these
limits in some instances, but never so far as to produce really
one-spurred flowers. Comparing this variety with the ordinary type, two
ways of passing over from the one to the other might be imagined. One
would entail a slow increase of the number of the peloric flowers on
each plant, combined with a decrease of the number of the normal ones,
the other a sudden leap from one extreme to the other without any
intermediate steps. The latter might easily be overlooked in field
observations and their failure may not have the value of direct proof.
They could never be overlooked, on the other hand, in experimental
culture.
The first record of the peloric toad-flax is that of Zioberg, a student
of Linnaeus, who found it in the neighborhood of Upsala.
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