424 REPORT OF THE CONFERENCE ON GENETICS. 
Plant-breeding is in its infancy, and too little has been done of a practical 
character in quantity to secure the general results to be attained by 
specialisation and selection from hundreds of thousands of composite 
hybrids. 
How many animal-breeders would be satisfied with sires whose 
progeny were largely weeds? How were these high-class animal sires 
produced? How are new domestic races and strains of cattle, sheep, 
dogs, poultry, pigeons, and other animals and birds obtained? Certainly 
not by the general practice of plant-breeders. 
Of what practical value is the knowledge of the component ratios of 
life forces in simple hybrids, in comparison with that knowledge giving 
results in the highest ratios of useful and valuable qualities ?—thereby 
saving labour, time, space, and expense, and giving, in the place of curios, 
the highest possible percentage of quality in economic types. 
My advice to plant-breeders is to multiply types by many thousands, 
using specially proved selections as sires, on the lines practised by 
successful animal-breeders. Select and develop domestic races and 
sections of such high quality, vitality, and general adaptability, that their 
progeny will not only be of higher quality than the parents, but that 
this quality will be produced in quantity in the highest possible ratio. 
This is practical plant-breeding. 
It is not necessary at a conference like this to detail many of the more 
simple effects of the influence of the vital forces directed by the operator 
in hybridisation, such as control of colour, form, and special markings in 
the flower, size, habit, vitality, and reproductive powers in the plant, or 
the increase or diminution of the component chemical constituents 
affecting the commercial value of our productions. 
The operation of crossing, to be practical, must be understood from 
the important aspect of its blending of diverse chemical constituents, and 
the critical breeder will be interested in observing the daily decomposition 
set up by his experimental blending, and the chemical action referred to, 
as this frequently causes partial or complete disintegration of the forms 
resulting from such crosses. 
I have said “ daily ” for the reason that this influence is apparent from 
the germination of the seed, and its daily development during every 
season preceding the maturity and fixity of a type, until its dominancy 
and stability are assured. This lesson reads from one day to five years in 
my specialty. I do not mean that each single variety needs this daily 
scrutiny, but that in the daily development of many thousands of seedlings 
some live one day, others two, and so on daily, until the close of the 
season, the seed-bed is an object lesson on the lines to which I have 
referred, and that stability is not assured even at full maturity. 
For practical and valuable economic results it is therefore not sufficient 
that the breeder should be able to produce types of symmetry and beauty, 
but he must add the qualities of stability and adaptability to changed 
conditions to ensure due satisfaction for the ultimate grower. 
In closing I will record one of many unique results in my experience 
in exhaustive work on this one plant, for the purpose of illustrating the 
subtle yet distinct character of the vital forces directed by the plant- 
breeder. From among some types showing a tendency to produce double 
a. 
