2i8 THE NEW AGRICULTURE. 



stroyed. Thus generation after generation were grown, only 

 the most fragrant being selected for the successive plantings, 

 until now a dahlia with the fragrance of the magnolia is an 

 existent thing. 



In precisely the same way may any color and any hue be 

 given to a flower. The white plumes of the pampas grass 

 have been bred from white to pink. A California poppy was 

 found which by a fortuitous variation had a crimson thread 

 like a thin stream of blood running down its inner surface. 

 In succeeding generations, by selection, this red has been 

 more and more increased, until out of it has developed the 

 crimson poppy. We are authoritatively assured that a blue 

 rose is attainable. Burbank declares that we may have any 

 color we wish. Pink flowers and white have been cross-fer- 

 tilized, and the result has been an offspring in which both 

 colors appear and are beautifully arranged. Some of these 

 days, when to the red rose and the white rose there is added 

 a rose of blue, some patriot plant breeder will cross the three 

 and then Nature will give us an American Beauty which will 

 set at rest forever the discussion as to which shall be con- 

 sidered our National flower. 



These wonderful works in the plant world are fraught 

 with a large meaning. They mean the addition of many mil- 

 lions of acres to the available domain of man. They mean 

 the aesthetic improvement of the world and the enormous en- 

 richment of the race. They mean the discrediting and re- 

 jection of a great body of hoary doctrine. They mean that 

 Mendel is an authority no longer, and that Hubrecht and 

 De Vries must reconstruct their theories. They are pro- 

 foundly affecting philosophy, and are battering at the very 



