NEW CREATIONS IN PLANT LIFE 



this stock as a basis; finally you have the 

 perfected tree just as you wish it. Once pro- 

 duced, it is, save in minor essentials, unchang- 

 ing. You can change the grain of the tree, 

 or its bark, or its top, or its trunk, or its 

 leaves, or its roots, or its quantity of quinine, 

 or sugar, or pitch, or what not; — you can 

 hardly think of anything you cannot do with 

 it. You can make it grow tall or short, huge 

 of girth or slender, narrow of branch or broad, 

 you can change the number of leaves it will 

 bear upon a branch and their shape. You can 

 chemically transform it, too. Of course, the 

 habits of the tree must first be firmly enough 

 fixed through sufficient generations so that it 

 will not revert — then it will go onward in its 

 new course ; or, by grafting, at once. 



"There are certain things which do not 

 seem possible, certain crosses of trees of widely 

 separated species that seem out of the ques- 

 tion. Still, while these crosses may never 

 become what might be termed commercially 

 effective, not practical, in other words, yet 

 they may be what may be called scientifically 

 successful. In other words, the actual act of 

 crossing may be accomplished where it has 



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