44 THE THEORY OF NATURAL SELECTION 
affording the material upon which natural selection 
might be expected to operate. 
The idea that a selective influence exists in Nature 
arose from a study of the remarkable effects produced 
in the case of domestic animals and plants by the action 
of artificial selection. Darwin seems, however, to have 
been a little credulous in accepting the statements of 
certain breeders with regard to their power of producing 
any desired new type to order. Now that scientific 
men are themselves beginning to make experiments 
in breeding, with the check of exact records to act 
as a drag upon the exuberance of the imagination, 
they are becoming somewhat sceptical as to the mystic 
and almost miraculous powers attributed to the old- 
fashioned breeders, though, indeed; Mr. Luther Bur- 
bank would seem to be a survival from the period 
we speak of, if the statements of his recent enthusiastic 
biographer are to be credited.* Less gifted but more 
methodical observers find that they have no creative 
powers worth speaking of, and that all they can do is 
to keep a sharp look-out for the novelties which Nature 
may send them. 
~~ Selection, whether natural or artificial; can indeed 
of itself have no power in the direction of creating 
_anything new ; its influence is ucti reserva- 
tive, but nothing more than this. The breeder keeps 
the new forms which take his fancy, and destroys the 
rest _; that-is the whole story. 
* Harwood, ‘ New Creations in Plant Life.’ Mr. Burbank 
certainly seems to have a really wonderful instinct for the dis- 
covery of curious and useful novelties. 
