MARVELOUS POSSIBILITIES 265 



ultimate consumer, the plum is likely to lose one 

 of its most attractive charms long before its real 

 freshness or flavor has begun to depreciate. 



With many of the plumcots, however, the vel- 

 vety bloom remains through growing, picking, 

 sorting, shipping, handling, and sale. Which 

 means, of course, that the grower, the shipper 

 and dealer receive a better profit, and the con- 

 sumer gladly pays the extra cost, because ap- 

 pearance, after all, is nearly as valuable a point 

 in a fruit as size, flavor, or quality. This one im- 

 provement in the plumcot greatly increases the 

 earning capacity of the fruit, whi(^h is simply an- 

 other evidence of the importance, in plant im- 

 provement (and elsewhere), of things which, at 

 first, we are too apt to regard as trifles. 



It is the seeming trifles, after all, which appear 

 to have the greatest effect on prices and profits. 



Of two samples of canned asparagus one may 

 command more than twice the retail price of the 

 other, and also bring perhaps nearly double the 

 profit to the grower, simply because of the trifle 

 that one variety of asparagus holds its form and 

 color through all the operations from the garden 

 to the table, while the other, dark colored or 

 broken in structure, presents an unappetizing 

 appearance when served, and since it costs no 

 more to raise the best asaparagus, after the ex- 



