ACCOMPLISHING THE IMPOSSIBLE 

 THE PLUMCOT 



A CROSS WHICH MAN HAD SAID COULD NEVER BE 



MADE 



SEVERAL years ago a party of noted scientists 

 from various parts of the world were visit- 

 ing my nursery. 



I asked one of them an American, even then 

 well known to 'the public as an authority on horti- 

 cultural subjects to come over to another part of 

 the grounds and see one of my crosses between 

 the plum and the apricot; one of my first crosses 

 then just ripening. 



"There can be no such fruit," my visitor 

 declared. "The two species are wholly different in 

 all respects. Everybody knows it is impossible to 

 cross two trees of such widely varying types as 

 the plum and the apricot." 



I was not surprised to hear him make this 

 statement. For at that time very few biologists 

 and in particular few technical botanists had 

 quite given up the notion that there are hard and 



[VOLUME V CHAPTER IX] 



