From M. T. Masters   21 September 1869

My dear Sir/

Many thanks for your note and the accompanying pamphlets.¹

At the Hort. Soc. meeting to day Mr Fenn (Rectory Woodstock) showed some Potatos which would I think have interested you had you seen them viz. 1. results of grafting potatos—all failures except one which may be all right ‘Milky white’ grafted into a fluke— result an inferior potato having the characters of both parents²

2^d. A large series of tubers the result of a single cross between a round red potato & a white round. The offspring are of all sorts sizes shapes colors degrees of hardihood etc—but what is most curious is that he has got among them a small round mottled tuber which is almost precisely identical with some so called wild tubers grown in Peru—a nice case of reversion!—³ The half bloods exhibit traces of the blood of both parents in very varying degrees— I asked him to forward you samples— He assures me he took great pains to prevent crop fertilisation with other sorts but as I understand the experiments were conducted en pleine terre   foreign pollen may have been introduced without his knowledge   In any case the reversion fact remains

Believe me | faithfully yrs | Maxwell. T. Masters