BURBANK IN THE ORCHARD 



quick but searching glance at each successive 

 seedling. He knows precisely what he is looking 

 for, and his eye detects niceties of variation that 

 would be discerned by no one else. 



Mr. Burbank is able thus to pass under review, 

 for appraisal, five thousand, ten thousand, even 

 twenty thousand seedlings in an hour. This ca- 

 pacity for almost occult divination of the qualities 

 of the seedling enables him to make thousands of 

 series of experiments simultaneously, and to test 

 millions of plants on experiment farms that have 

 an aggregate surface of only twenty-two acres. 

 He is always carrying forward at least three thou- 

 sand series of experiments. All in all, he has car- 

 ried out more than one hundred thousand such 

 series of experiments, involving almost as many 

 varieties of plants (for he seldom repeats an ex- 

 periment), and more than three thousand distinct 

 species. 



It will be understood, of course, that the experi- 

 ment is not finished when the seedlings are se- 

 lected. It is really only begun. The selected seed- 

 ling must be grafted, and allowed in due course to 

 bear fruit. Then, and not before, can its quality 

 be finally and positively known. 



Visitors who have seen Mr. Burbank making 

 such a test as that just suggested have sometimes 

 questioned whether it could possibly be a really 

 accurate one. 



The results achieved should fairly enough an- 

 swer the question, but the matter has been put 

 to an even more decisive test. On one occasion, 



[61] 



