THE WHITE BLACKBERRY 



How A COLOR TRANSFORMATION WAS 

 BROUGHT ABOUT 



TO SPEAK of white blackbirds or of white 

 blackberries is to employ an obvious contra- 

 diction of terms. Yet we all know that now 

 and again a blackbird does appear that is pure 

 white. And visitors to my experiment gardens 

 during the past twenty years can testify that the 

 white blackberry is something more than an oc- 

 casional product that it is, in short, a fully es- 

 tablished and highly productive variety of fruit. 

 There is no record of anyone having ever seen 

 a truly white blackberry until this anomalous 

 fruit was produced. 



Nevertheless it should be explained at the 

 outset that the berry with the aid of which I de- 

 veloped the new fruit was called a white black- 

 berry. It was a berry found growing wild in 

 New Jersey, and introduced as a garden novelty, 

 with no pretense to value as a table fruit, by Mr. 

 T. J. Lovett. He called ihe berry "Crystal 



325 



