Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 84.djvu/167

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 Grimes' apple having six carpels. Slightly reduced.

The first, a specimen of the Ben Davis, consisted of two nearly independent apples united for only a short distance near the base. The stem, originally single, had been split nearly to the base, while that part of the fruit between the insertion of the stem and the point of union of the apples had been broken apart as the apples had developed at the base. The two portions, thus almost completely separated, had each developed into a nearly perfect apple, though of small size. The cores were perfect and the axes, which were nearly straight, extended in almost opposite directions.

The second specimen, a Jonathan, consisted of two apples of unequal size joined together throughout their entire length and marked off from each other only by a shallow groove. The single stem upon which the fruit was borne was split for a short distance as the two portions spread apart in growing. When cut open each section was found to have an independent core containing perfect seeds, although in the smaller part that portion of the core adjacent to the other part was undeveloped. The axes of the cores, moreover, were strongly curved away from each other. The specimen from Wenatchee was similar in all important respects to the one just described and further account of it will not be necessary. Both of the double apples grown at Pullman are shown whole and in section in the accompanying illustrations.

Double apples of this kind originate in a manner quite different from the double plums mentioned above. The presence on the mature apple of two separate calyx cups indicates that these apples were produced by distinct blossoms borne at the end of a single flower stalk. In