LUTHER BURBANK 



The company were pleased with the invention, 

 and I might have remained indefinitely in their 

 employ at a remunerative salary. But the clouds 

 of dust that came from the oak lumber began to 

 impair my health and it was thought best to leave 

 the shop for a while at least. So my experience 

 as a manufacturer of wood products ended. My 

 subsequent work was to be performed in the open; 

 except, indeed, for a brief period when I returned 

 to the Ames works for temporary employment at 

 turning and at pattern making. 



CHOOSING A PROFESSION 



I was always frail of body and of delicate 

 physique, although wiry of build and not with- 

 out good powers of endurance. But shop life 

 further weakened me, and I had the misfortune 

 soon after leaving the shop to be partially over- 

 come by the heat, owing to a three mile run on an 

 exceedingly hot day to notify the local officers of 

 the Boston and Maine Railroad that sparks from 

 one of their locomotives had set my father's wood 

 lots on fire, and to obtain aid in controlling the 

 flames. 



Perhaps it was this experience in particular 

 that led me to think of taking up medicine as a 

 profession. On the whole it seemed to me that 

 this would be most congenial, and I studied for a 

 year with the intention of becoming a doctor. I 



[48] 



