BREEDING PLANTS 



191 



nature. This habit of observation gave him passionate 

 delight, and finally started him, while he was yet a youth, 

 upon his great work. 



While hoeing in his potato patch one day, he noticed an 

 unusually interesting seed ball on a remarkably vigorous 

 potato vine. This hill of potatoes he guarded carefully, 

 and when the seed was 

 ripe, he gathered it. 

 From this seed he pro- 

 duced the celebrated 

 " Burbank " potato. It 

 is said that a local seeds- 

 man paid the young man 

 f 150 for the right to use 

 this discovery. High 

 authorities declare that 

 the dissemination of this 

 variety of potato has 

 enriched the farmers of 

 America to the extent 

 of $20,000,000. 



Better still, it showed 

 how to go to work to 

 obtain other varieties, 

 and since that time there 

 have been developed, from promising seed balls, several 

 kinds of potatoes even more valuable than the Burbank. 

 Best of all, the creation of the Burbank potato started 

 young Burbank upon a new career that has benefited the 

 world beyond all computation. On his extensive experi- 

 ment grounds in California he has worked miracles in plant 

 creation and improvement. All the marvelous plant 

 work mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter was 

 done there by him and his little army of trained assistants. 



LUTHER BURBANK. 



