LUTHER BURBANK 



That there are about four hundred families in 

 my patrician cherry colony is a matter of acci- 

 dent, quite uninfluenced by any thought of imita- 

 tion. It chances that year by year the process of 

 elimination about balances the process of addition 

 to the family, and the census of the colony is not 

 greatly altered. 



Reference has been made in various earlier 

 chapters to the origin and development of the 

 patrician cherries. They are closely related as 

 to their remote ancestry, as I suppose is the case 

 with the members of every other aristocracy. Yet, 

 as we have seen, the ancestral traits are variously 

 blended in the different families, and there is 

 notable diversity among them as to individual 

 traits. Some of them bear fruit that is vividly 

 red in color, others fruit that is pallid; and there 

 are corresponding divergences as to flavor, free- 

 dom of stone, sugar content, and all the rest of 

 the complex characteristics of a well-bred cherry. 



Of course these qualities are variously re- 

 combined in the progeny of each new generation. 

 So I can never tell what surprise is in store for me 

 when I raise seedlings from the fruit. 



And there are always new additions to the 

 colony that will only come into bearing next sea- 

 son or the season after and reveal what they hold 

 in store. 



[70] 



