LUTHER BURBANK 



plant developer who expects to find a considerable 

 number — let us say nine — of particular qualities 

 of any given flower or fruit or vegetable combined 

 in just the desired proportion in any single 

 seedling selected at random, stands about the 

 same chance of having his expectations gratified 

 that you have of spelling out the word "evolution" 

 correctly with blocks drawn at random. 



But it is obvious that your chance of successful 

 drawing of the blocks would increase in proportion 

 as the number of attempts you are permitted to 

 make increases. 



So would the plant experimenter's chance of 

 finding several desired qualities of his fruit or 

 flower combined in just the right proportion 

 increase somewhat in proportion to the number 

 of seedlings among which he can select. 



Yet I suppose the mathematician would assure 

 us that the number of attempts you must make 

 with the blocks before you could hope, according 

 to the theory of chances, to bring out all the letters 

 in just the right sequence would be so large as to 

 tax your patience beyond endurance and I can 

 testify that the same thing holds true with regard 

 to the experiment of the plant developer. Though 

 he had thousands of seedlings among which to 

 choose he is not likely to find any one in a given 

 fraternity that fully meets his ideal. 



[100] 



