We recently came across the following piece of manuscript written many years ago by the Editor and misplaced. It is true enough to appear yet; and it also shows that one may "live and learn;" for if written in these latter times, the position that hybrids are not necessarily sterile would be much more strongly stated :

"It is well known that in a wild state the common blackberry varies so much, that no two botanists can agree as to what is a species. Some make hundred, while others but a very few, and class the species of the other botanists as simply varieties of species. There has seemed to be no way out of this trouble, as all parties assume that there ought to be definite species somewhere.

"A Dr. Foche, in Germany, has, however, made some discoveries, which he thinks will solve the question. He has examined a great number of these forms, and finds in many of them that the anthers are entirely destitute of pollen. This is a very interesting fact. Then he infers from this that they are hybrids; but this may not be a fact. It is too much the fashion in Europe to attribute sterility to hybridization. Undoubtedly hybrids are often mules; but not always - not any way near always.

"This theory of Dr. Foche's assumes that there were originally a few species, and that they have hybridized together naturally, and hence the varieties. The sterile anthers afforded the only proof.

" That this does not prove it is clear from the observations of Dr. Horatio Wood given in our journal two years ago. He discovered that the anthers in Dr. Houghton's Pear blossoms had no pollen, in advance of Fochc's discoveries. Whatever may have caused this it is clear that it was not hybridization; for the Pear, Pyrus communis, will not hybridize with other species of Pyrus so far as known".