130 LUTHER BURBANK 



ify a large number of obscure cases that must 

 prove very puzzling to the novitiate in plant 

 development. 



EXPLAINING THE BLACK SHEEP 



Let us now state our way, as it were, with the 

 aid of the upper-case and lower-case letters, 

 along the line of a series of plant experiments 

 through which a certain patrician cherry was de- 

 veloped. To avoid complications and to escape 

 getting into a tangle of ideas and a maze of 

 letters, let us consider only a single quality in 

 detail, keeping in the background of our minds 

 the idea that the actual experimenter is at all 

 times considering almost innumerable other qual- 

 ities as well. 



The one quality that we will consider at the 

 moment is, let us say, the matter of size. We 

 wish, for some special purpose, to develop a 

 cherry that shall be a giant among cherries, yet 

 which of course shall combine size with quality. 



Now we have at hand a cherry that bears very 

 large fruit of poor quality. We have also at 

 hand a tree that bears small fruit of delicious 

 quality. Our first step will be to transfer pollen 

 from the stamens of one of these to the pistils of 

 the other. We carefully mark the branches bear- 

 ing the hybridized flowers ; and subsequently we 



