| An attempt has been made to subdivide a very polymorphous plant species by means of a quantitative statistical method. This method has been based upon the following working hypothesis: 1° as some morphological characters of the material, concerning e. g. the shape of the leaves, the length of the pedicels etc., show an extremely great variation, each of these characters in every specimen at hand may be stated to be in one of three (one intermediate and two extreme) conditions; 2° if a character happens to be in an intermediate condition in a relatively great number of specimens the difference between the extreme conditions of that character may be considered insignificant from a taxonomical point of view; 3° the fewer characters of two or more specimens... |
