'^ BURBANK'S WORK 209 



pleasures of life and the opportunities for making 

 fortunes. To give a full list would make this 

 chapter too much like a catalogue; so I will call 

 attention to only a few of the most important 

 novelties. 



It is time to stop talking about this man's 

 wizardlike but impractical feats, such as growing 

 potatoes on tomato vines or producing an apple 

 sour on one side, sweet on the other. Scien- 

 tifically such things are tremendously interesting 

 and important, showing that almost anything 

 can be done with fruits and plants, and opening 

 up brilliant vistas of future achievements; but 

 what we want to do now is to help Burbank, 

 while he is still with us, to banish mediocrity 

 from our orchards and gardens by enriching 

 them with the numerous products of his 

 creative genius and his passion for the best 

 only. 



Burbank seems inclined to think that the 

 most interesting of his fruits is the stoneless 

 plum. One of the proudest moments in his life 

 was when a visitor, a famous pomologist, cut 

 into one of these plums and, to his utter bewil- 

 derment, found it had no pit. Removing the 

 stone was not only a master stroke of horti- 

 cultural ingenuity and perseverance, but it has 

 tremendous commercial importance. The time 

 will come, he believes, when all the plums that 

 come into our markets will be stoneless; his 

 hybrids of this novelty already represent almost 



