NEW CREATIONS IN PLANT LIFE 



for the time considering has had a small, insig- 

 nificant blossom all its life, all the life, anyway, 

 that is recorded by man. Its life tendencies 

 have centered and culminated, so to speak, in 

 this pitifully inadequate bloom. The blossom 

 is not only small and unattractive in form but 

 weak in color, hard by the realm of the outcast 

 weeds. But he has seen in it great possibil- 

 ities; swiftly he sets about its improvement. 

 Possibly he sees that by combining it with 

 some near related flower friend he may make 

 it lovelier, perhaps he decides that the only way 

 to do is to pick out the very best of its kind 

 from among a thousand or ten thousand 

 plants and from this best one, poor though it 

 may be, go on and on in a constant succession 

 of upward selections from the plants that 

 follow the seeding, until at last he brings 

 forth the blossom he sought, beautiful, large, 

 richer in color, fine and velvety in texture, a 

 royal addition to the blossoms of the world. 

 It takes long to do this,— perhaps twenty 

 years. Twenty years to produce a new flower? 

 Certainly, why not? Is it not worth it? Not 

 that he may spend his whole time for that 

 term on a single plant, — a whole series of them 



SO 



