152 LUTHER BURBANK 



or so might make up a molecule of a different 

 type of protoplasm. 



So here is material for millions of kinds of 

 protoplasm, were so many needed. 



Here within the infinitesimal germ cell, re- 

 vealed to us in part by the microscope of the 

 biologist and for the rest made manifest in im- 

 agination by the revelations of the physicist, 

 is material enough to supply tangible carriers 

 for all the conceivable hereditary factors that 

 come to make up the most complex organism of 

 any plant, or for that matter of any animate 

 creature whatever. 



THE GERM CELL A COMPLEX ORGANISM 



Let us make the illustration specific. Suppose 

 that the chromosome in the nucleus of any given 

 pollen grain say that of a plum blossom were 

 of the very smallest size visible under the micro- 

 scope. Suppose, also, merely for the sake of 

 illustration, that the hereditary factors for unit 

 characters that it bears are of a thousand differ- 

 ent types representing all details of size and 

 color and foliage and growth and leaf and blos- 

 som and fruit of the future tree. We know that 

 the chromosome really does bear these potential- 

 ities; I am merely assuming their number at a 

 thousand individual units for illustration. 



