In 1867 I sowed these seeds, and all five produced tall purple-flowered purplish-stemmed plants[106], and the seeds, with few exceptions, had all maple or brownish-streaked envelopes of various shades; the remainder had entirely violet or deep purple-coloured envelopes[107]: in shape the peas were partly indented; but a few were round[108]. Some of the plants ripened off earlier than the “maple,” which, in comparison with “Ringleader,” is a late variety; and although the pods were in many instances partially abortive, the produce was very large[109]. [106] Tall heterozygotes, with normal dominance of purple flowers. [107] Here we see dominance of the _pigmented_ seed-coat as a maternal character over _white_ seed-coat. The colours of the seed-coats are described as essentially two: maple or brown-streaked, and violet, the latter being a small minority. As the sequel shows, the latter are heterozygotes, not breeding true. Now Mendel found, and the fact has been confirmed both by Correns and myself, that crossing a grey pea which is capable of producing purple leads to such production as a form of xenia. We have here therefore in the purple seeds the union of dissimilar gametes, with production of xenia. But as the brown-streaked seeds are also in part heterozygous, the splitting of a compound allelomorph has probably taken place, though without precise statistics and allotment of offspring among the several seeds the point is uncertain. The colour of seed-coats in “grey” peas and probably “maples” also is, as was stated on p. 150, sensitive to conditions, but the whole difference between “maples” and purple is too much to attribute safely to such irregularity. “Maple” is the word used to describe certain seed-coats which are pigmented with intricate brown mottlings on a paler buff ground. In French they are _perdrix_. [108] This is not, as it stands, explicable. It seems from this point and also from what follows that if the account is truly given, some of the plants may have been mosaic with segregation of characters in particular flowers; but see subsequent note. [109] As, commonly, in heterozygotes when fertile.