92 LUTHER BURBANK 



has been secured from whole fields of beets in 

 Colorado. This should be a wonderful stimulant 

 to plant developers everywhere. 



There is perhaps no other case so widely 

 known or involving such large financial interests 

 in which a corresponding improvement has been 

 made in a commercial plant within recent years. 



My own share in this work has been, until 

 quite recently, that of an adviser rather than 

 that of a direct experimenter. Some twenty- 

 five years ago I was asked by the sugar-beet 

 manufacturers of both Europe and America to 

 take up the improvement of the beet. But while 

 I gladly advised in the matter, and pointed out 

 the lines of development through which further 

 improvement might be expected, was unable to 

 give personal attention to experiments with the 

 beet, owing to the pressure of almost numberless 

 other lines of investigation. 



More recently, however, I have experimented 

 with varieties of the beet that were already very 

 greatly improved, working with seeds supplied 

 by prominent beet raisers who had developed 

 their product by combining the qualities of ten 

 or more varieties of Russian, German, French, 

 and English sugar beets. 



The cross-breeding experiments through which 

 I was endeavoring to increase still further the 



