LUTHER BURBANK 



have had occasion constantly to realize in later 

 life how valuable this experience was. The knowl- 

 edge of physiology and practical hygiene thus 

 gained could many times be applied to the direc- 

 tion and interpretation of plant experiments. 



It is quite possible that I should have continued 

 my studies and have graduated in medicine had 

 not the death of my father occurred at this time. 

 This changed all our plans. The family moved to 

 Groton — now Ayer — Massachusetts, where we lived 

 for two years and where I took up the line of work 

 that was to reveal an inherent bent and to lay the 

 foundations of future activities. 



That is to say, I became a practical nurseryman 

 and gardener. 



It was perhaps inevitable that I should have 

 come ultimately to take up this line of work, 

 because from earliest childhood my chief delight 

 had been found in the study of nature and in par- 

 ticular in the companionship of flowers. 



It is recorded by those who watched tenderly 

 over me in my childhood that I was a quiet, seri- 

 ous child, whose most notable trait was a love, 

 amounting almost to reverence, for flowers of 

 every kind. 



"A blossom placed in the baby hands," writes 

 my sister, "would always stay his falling tears. 

 Flowers were never destroyed by him, but if, per- 



[50] 



