THE LUTHER BURBANK SOCIETY 



manufacturer takes his orders for the coming year. 



It is all, of course, as in plant life, a survival of 

 the fittest. By the old process the manufacturer 

 who made the closest guess survived, while the 

 others perished. By the new process, all manufac- 

 turers have an equal chance of survival, because 

 the question of to be or not to be has been pro- 

 pounded to the clothing itself and not to the 

 maker. 



So, in almost all lines of trade — which, after 

 all, being the most acute fight for existence, is the 

 most ready exemplar of evolution — the tendency 

 has been to let the ultimate consumer shape, as 

 far as possible the qualities and characteristics of 

 the thing which he is to consume. 



In almost all lines of trade this is true, but in 

 the business of writing books this new evolution- 

 ary tendency had not as yet made itself evident. 



The procedure in the making of books has, as 

 always, been this: The author conceives an idea 

 which he believes to be of interest to a great num- 

 ber of readers; without consultation with those 

 readers he conceives a form of presentation and 

 writes his idea, or ideas into words which are 

 turned over to the publisher; and the publisher, 

 like the old manufacturer of clothing, without con- 

 sultation with his public, makes such changes in 

 the manuscript as he conceives his public would 



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