LUTHER BURBANK 



ardently espoused during a period of at least six- 

 teen years subsequent to the death of Mendel, 

 during which they had no other champion. 



What I have deprecated, however, in recent 

 years, is the over-enthusiasm of certain alleged 

 followers of Mendel, who have entertained what I 

 conceived to be a misapprehension as to the real 

 significance of "unit characters", and who, mis- 

 guided by a narrow range of experiments, and 

 lacking the breadth of view that comes with wider 

 experience, have supposed that all heritable char- 

 acters might be classified as fixed and unvarying 

 entities that are transmitted in accordance with 

 the Mendelian formula. 



Fortunately, a good many former holders of 

 this biased and inadequate view have seen its in- 

 sufficiency, and already there is a tendency to 

 react from it, evidenced in the writings of some of 

 the leading Mendelians; and, coupled with this, the 

 tendency to take a broader view of heredity and to 

 understand that there are countless heritable char- 

 acters that do not Mendelize in any tangible or 

 demonstrable way; that "unit characters" are 

 themselves made up of subordinated characters; 

 that new "unit characters" from time to time ap- 

 pear, whereas old ones that at one time Mendelized 

 are finally so fixed that they blend with the older 

 structure of heredity and no longer present the 



[200] 



