LUTHER BURBANK 



walnuts furnished the typical illustration of this 

 on the most spectacular scale. 



The fruit of these almond-peach hybrids varied 

 a good deal on different trees. Sometimes the 

 fruit was leathery like that of the almond, but in 

 other cases it was edible and quite peach-like. In 

 a few cases the pulp was so fully developed that 

 it might be considered a fairly good peach. The 

 seed covering was usually in the shape of an 

 almond and smoother, thinner, and generally more 

 elongated than the peach stone. It was hard- 

 shelled and corrugated, but had not the texture 

 of the peach stone. The meat within was sweet 

 or slightly bitter, suggesting a rather inferior 

 almond. 



Thus the fruit of this hybrid might be said to 

 be fairly intermediate between the fruits of the 

 parents, yet on the whole the flesh of the peach 

 and the stone of the almond, respectively, tended 

 to be prepotent. This is what would perhaps be 

 expected, when we recall that the flesh is the spe- 

 cialized modern development in the case of the 

 peach, and that the seed is similarly specialized 

 and developed in the case of the almond. 



We have found occasion to believe that pre- 

 potency or dominance is conditioned on newness 

 of development; the case of the peach-almond 

 hybrid gives a measure of support to this theory. 



[78] 



