LUTHER BURBANK 



Professor De Vries was unable to explain the 

 cause of the mutation; but Mr. Burbank at once 

 declared his belief that the celebrated evening 

 primrose with which Professor De Vries had 

 worked was really a hybrid, and this explanation 

 is now coming to be pretty generally accepted. 



Certain it is that Mr. Burbank has produced 

 mutants without number in the course of his ex- 

 periments through the process of hybridization, 

 a mutant being described as a form that departs 

 radically from the type of its seed parent. The 

 particular mutants that first attracted the atten- 

 tion of Professor De Vries bred true to the new 

 type from seed, thus seeming to constitute a new 

 race. The same thing is true of many of the 

 mutants that Mr. Burbank has produced by hy- 

 bridization. But as to this point, there is oppor- 

 tunity for diversity of habit. A new form pro- 

 duced by hybridization may breed true, as in the 

 case of Mr. Burbank 's Primus berry, but it is 

 much more likely, as we have seen illustrated, to 

 show a great diversity of form among its imme- 

 diate progeny. Some of these forms may breed 

 true, while others will fail to do so. 



This is of the utmost importance to the plant 

 developer, particularly in the case of annual 

 plants that must be grown from seed. In the case 

 of plants that can be reproduced by division the 

 matter is not so important, as any new variety 

 developed may be propagated indefinitely without 

 use of the seed. Such is the regular method of 

 propagation, as we have seen, in the case of the 



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