"It is indeed growen to be a great question, whether the transmutation of a species be possible either in the vegetable, Animal, or Minerall Kingdome. For the possibility of it in the vegetable; I have heard _Mr. Bobart_ and his _Son_ often report it, and proffer to make oath that the Crocus and Gladiolus, as likewise the Leucoium, and Hyacinths by a long standing without replanting have in his garden changed from one kind to the other: and for satisfaction about the curiosity in the presence of _Mr. Boyle_ I tooke up some bulbs of the very numericall roots whereof the relation was made, though the alteration was perfected before, where we saw the diverse bulbs growing as it were on the same stoole, close together, but no bulb half of the one kind, and the other half of the other: But the changetime being past it was reason we should believe the report of good artists in matters of their own faculty." Robert Sharrock was a fellow of New College, Oxford. Both the Bobarts were professional botanists, the father was author of a Catalogue of the plants in the Hortus Medicus at Oxford, and the son was afterwards Curator of the Oxford Garden. [4] _Mém. Ac. roy. des Sci._ for 1719 (1721), p. 59. [5] _Amoen. Acad._, 1789, vol. 6. I do not know whether attention has been called to the curious mistake which Linnaeus makes in the course of this argument. He cites the differences between the Mule and the Hinny in illustration of his thesis, pointing out that the Mule is externally more like a horse and the Hinny more like an ass. This, he says, is because the Mule has the horse for a father, and the Hinny the ass, thus inverting the actual facts! [6] _Proc. Washington Ac. Sci._, 1909, XI, pp. 17-26. [7] J. W. Tutt, in _Ent. Rec._, 1909, XXI, p. 185. [8] E. Lehmann (_Bull. l'Herb. Boissier_, Ser. 2, VIII, 1908, p. 229) has published an admirable paper on the interrelationships of these species and has instituted cultural experiments which will probably much elucidate the nature of their specific distinctness. As regards the existence of intermediate forms he comes to the conclusion that two only can be so regarded. The first was described by Kuntze from specimens found on a flower-pot on board a Caspian steamer, from which Lehmann proposes the new specific name _Siaretensis_. This comes between _polita_ and _filiformis_, a close ally of _Tournefortii_. The other, which combines some of the features of both _polita_ and _Tournefortii_, was found in the province of Asterabad. [9] In Cambridgeshire for example _vespertina_ is common but _diurna_ is absent. Whether this absence is connected with the general presence of chalk I cannot say. When introduced artificially _diurna_ establishes itself, for a time at least, without any apparent difficulty and occasionally escapes from the garden on to the neighbouring roadside.