But an insect visiting, first, a long-styled plant, would deposit the pollen on the stigma of another plant of the same kind if it were next visited; and this is probably the reason why the wild short-styled plants were found to be almost always most productive of seed, since they must be all fertilised by the other form, whereas the long-styled plants might often be fertilised by their own form. The whole arrangement, however, ensures cross-fertilisation; and this, as Mr. Darwin has shown by copious experiments, adds both to the vigour and fertility of almost all plants as well as animals.
Besides the primrose family, many other plants of several distinct natural orders present similar phenomena, one or two of the most curious of which must be referred to. The beautiful crimson flax (Linum grandiflorum) has also two forms, the styles only differing in length; and in this case Mr. Darwin found by numerous experiments, which have since been repeated and confirmed by other observers, that each form is absolutely sterile with pollen from another plant of its own form, but abundantly fertile when crossed with any plant of the other form. In this case the pollen of the two forms cannot be distinguished under the microscope (whereas that of the two forms of Primula differs in size and shape), yet it has the remarkable property of being absolutely powerless on the stigmas of half the plants of its own species. The crosses between the opposite forms, which are fertile, are termed by Mr. Darwin "legitimate," and those between similar forms, which are sterile, "illegitimate"; and he remarks that we have here, within the limits of the same species, a degree of sterility which rarely occurs except between plants or animals not only of different species but of different genera.
But there is another set of plants, the trimorphic, in which the styles and stamens have each three forms—long, medium, and short, and in these it is possible to have eighteen different crosses. By an elaborate series of experiments it was shown that the six legitimate unions—that is, when a plant was fertilised by pollen from stamens of length corresponding to that of its style in the two other forms—were all abundantly fertile; while the twelve illegitimate unions, when a plant was fertilised by pollen from stamens of a different length from its
