226 THE NEW AGRICULTURE. 



Now all the means which Nature has made use of in bring- 

 ing about these marvelous variations in her creations in size 

 and shape and color and quality, whether of grain or fruit 

 or root or flower, aye, all that she has used in producing 

 an oak or a willow, a pine or a palm from a common ancestor 

 are to-day, with one exception, within the knowledge and 

 practical possession of man. The one respect in which Nature 

 has the advantage is Time, a tremendous advantage, indeed ; 

 but on the other hand, man has some compensations which, 

 while they do not balance Nature's advantage, are nevertheless 

 of very great importance, and are certainly pleasing to con- 

 template. 



In the first place, then, "natural selection acts slowly by ac- 

 cumulating slight successive favorable variations, and can, 

 therefore, produce no great or sudden manifestations ; it can 

 act only by very slow and short steps.' ' On the other hand, 

 man, whatever may be truthfully said of him in time gone 

 by, now acts quickly. He does not, as an illustration, sow 

 a seed and then wait years for it to grow and come into 

 bearing, in the mean time risking its preservation from frost 

 and heat and slug and browsing animal. He protects it from 

 every harm for a season and then cuts it up into small pieces, 

 grafts it onto an appropriate host some full-grown tree 

 and thus in two seasons he has fruit from the seed. 



In the second place, Nature acts only and solely for the 

 good of the being which she tends. To enable the species 

 to live and propagate this is the end and aim of all her work. 

 If she has man in mind at all, it is only that she may supply 

 him with the raw material, as it were, out of which he may 

 cultivate and manufacture that which contributes to his well- 

 being and is pleasing to his taste. But man's whole purpose 



