44 PLANT-BREEDING 



I need not now discuss the truth of this assertion, since 

 the same principle has been accepted by the German breeders. 

 I might, however, point out that the real difference between 

 Hallett's method and that of his two previously mentioned 

 countrymen is to be sought in the choice of the starting points 

 of their experiments. 



Le Couteur and Shirreff have expressed themselves 

 clearly on this point. With them, all depends upon the 

 first choice. What remains to be done afterward, is only 

 the multipHcation of the progeny of the chosen plant. 

 Hallett, on the other hand, is silent on this most essential 

 question. Like them, he started, in each single case, from 

 one plant, and therefore must have made a choice among 

 the types which his fields afforded him. On Shirreff 's 

 conception, this choice must have been the decisive point in 

 Hallett's work, and not the subsequent selection, and that 

 this is true may be proven by his arguments. In the first 

 place, Hallett has brought into the trade new and distinct 

 varieties, and not merely more productive strains of the ordi- 

 nary sorts. This may be seen by the names of the forms 

 already cited, and to which the very distinctive types of his 

 Golden Drop wheat and Chevalier barley may be added. 

 Moreover, it is proven by the fact that his varieties have 

 kept their place in agriculture at large and are still keep- 

 ing it, although it is a long time since Hallett himself dis- 

 continued their pedigree-culture. They are now known 

 to be independent varieties Hke those of Le Couteur and 

 Shirreff. 



A second argument is given in the fact that the value of 

 Hallett's varieties is dependent on his first choice, and that 

 if this should prove a mistake, no subsequent selection is 

 adequate to amend it. The proof of this is given by the 

 miscarrying of some of his pedigree-cultures. Of course, 

 most of these cases he will hardly have mentioned, but it is 



