Complimentary Banquet to Luther Burbank 



O 



world better for his having lived in it. But I am compelled 



to attend sessions of the United States Circuit Court of Ap- 

 peals during this month at Portland and Seattle, and will 

 not return until about the ist of October. 



The suggestion that I would be called upon, if present, 

 to say something about the Carnegie Institution, offers an 

 agreeable subject for discussion; and while the pleasure of 

 the occasion for me would be to hear others, rather than to 

 speak myself, the suggestion enables me to say in this letter 

 about all that I would say, if present. 



Of course I would like to say something in appreciation 

 of the work of my friend Mr. Burbank, whose achievements, 

 I understand, will be the general theme of the occasion. If 

 he is the benefactor of mankind who "makes two ears of 

 corn or two blades of grass to grow upon a spot of ground 

 where only one grew before," what shall we say of Burbank, 

 who makes tons of new varieties of vegetation to grow where 

 none grew before? The satire of Dean Swift upon the in- 

 significance of political service as compared with the value of 

 such a dominion over Nature is a needless disparagement of 

 political services which the country needs and must have, but 

 it does not overestimate the importance of a knowledge of 

 Nature and Nature's laws. Mr. Burbank has done much, 

 and will do more, if he is permitted to carry his plans into 

 execution. But it will be necessary now to give him time, 

 and time to himself, to enable him to follow in plant life the 

 intricate paths of Nature, and interpret to the world her 

 processes of evolution. 



Mr. Carnegie believes that man is destined to become an 

 absolute ruler in the kingdom of Nature, and so believing, 

 he founded the Carnegie Institution at Washington, to pro- 

 vide and develop the highest skill and most thorough appli- 



