LUTHER BURBANK 



white the unequivocal evidence of progress — or 

 of failure to progress. Few salient facts as to 

 the precise parentage of important hybrids and 

 the exact methods by which variation has been 

 brought about have failed to find explicit record, 

 notwithstanding the omission of multitudes of 

 details that to some observers might have seemed 

 worthy of transcription. 



And if I have adopted in the field shortcut 

 methods of recording selection, these have not 

 lacked precision and accuracy, notwithstanding 

 their time-saving character. 



In point of fact, all along the line I have 

 endeavored to strike a happy mediiun between 

 the waste of time that would result from the 

 keeping of unduly elaborate records, and the 

 waste of effort that would necessarily result if 

 no records at all were kept. 



The reader who would clearly comprehend the 

 nature of the compromise must bear in mind that 

 I have, as a rule, had a practical object in view 

 in conducting my experiments. It is true, as 

 Professor Bailey has courteously said, that I 

 constantly make experiments with plants for the 

 mere love of the work. It is true also that my 

 tests include hundreds of species from which I 

 expect no very definite return. Yet it is further 

 true that the main body of my experiments have 



[252] 



