MAKING NEW KINDS OF PLANTS 433 



which can hardly be defined in words and which may 

 be completely hidden from the ordinary observer. 



When the fruit appears it is carefully examined, 

 compared and tested : the seeds of the best are pre- 

 served and the rest are destroyed : out of a thousand or 

 more, only one or two may survive the rigid tests 

 which are applied. The seeds of these are sown and 

 the best again selected. This is continued indefinitely 

 until a desirable variety is secured, or until it be- 

 comes evident that no good results are to be expected: 

 in that case the plants are all destroyed, and the 

 work of years ends in nothing. 



It is very evident, therefore, that hybridization, 

 with all its marvelous results, is but the beginning 

 of plant -breeding. All that it does is to furnish 

 variations. To seize upon these, even though they 

 be slight, and divert them into the proper channels, 

 to intensify the good and suppress the undesirable 

 qualities, until the ideal is reached, is the task -of 

 selection. l 



When plants can be propagated by cuttings, grafts, 

 bulbs or other vegetative parts 2 the ideal once achieved 

 is easily maintained, for plants so propagated "come 

 true," or, in other words, maintain the characters 

 of the parent plant, with little variation. Far other- 

 wise, however, with plants which are propagated by 



!See articles in the Year -Book of the United States Department of 

 Agriculture for 1898, by Webber; for 1901, by Hays; for 1902, by Webber. 

 2 I. e., leaves, corms, rootstocks, roots, tubers, etc. 



BB 



