nd vegetables this was possible.
Papilionaceous flowers are almost dead floorers to me, and I cannot
experimentise, as castration alone often produces sterility. I am
surprised at what you say about Compositae and Gramineae. From what I
have seen of latter they seemed to me (and I have watched wheat,
owing to what L. de Longchamps has said on their fertilisation in bud)
favourable for crossing; and from Cassini's observations and Kolreuter's
on the adhesive pollen, and C.C. Sprengel's, I had concluded that the
Compositae were eminently likely (I am aware of the pistil brushing
out pollen) to be crossed. (586/1. This is an instance of the curious
ignorance of the essential principles of floral mechanism which was to
be found even among learned and accomplished botanists such as Gray,
before the publication of the "Fertilisation of Orchids." Even in 1863
we find Darwin explaining the meaning of dichogamy in a letter to Gray.)
If in some months' time you can find time to tell me whether you have
made any observations on the early fertilisation of plants in these two
orders, I should be very glad to hear, as it would save me from great
blunder. In several published remarks on this subject in various genera
it has seemed to me that the early fertilisation has been inferred
from the early shedding of the pollen, which I think is clearly a false
inference. Another cause, I should think, of the belief of fertilisation
in the bud, is the not-rare, abnormal, early maturity of the pistil as
described by Gartner. I have hitherto failed in meeting with detailed
accounts of regular and normal impregnation in the bud. Podostemon and
Subularia under water (and Leguminosae) seem and are strongest cases
against me, as far as I as yet know. I am so sorry that you are so
overwhelmed with work; it makes your VERY GREAT kindness to me the more
striking.

It is really pretty to see how effectual insects are. A short time ago
I found a female holly sixty measured yards from any other holly, and
I cut off some twigs and took by chance twenty stigmas, cut off their
tops, and put them under the microscope: there was pollen on every one,
and in profusion on most! weather cloudy and stormy and unfavourable,
wind in wrong direction to have brought any.

LETTER 587. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, January 12th [1858].

I want to ask a question which will take you only few words to answer.
It bears on my former belief (and Asa Gray strongly expressed opinio