ORIGINATING NEW VARIETIES. 107 
not owing so much to the seedling which was first 
chosen as it was to the subsequent selections faithfully 
persisted in. 
Some Modern Examples of Plant Improvement 
by Selection.—All of the present fine races of tomato 
were produced by A. W. Livingston through selection. 
The first variety produced (introduced in 1870) which 
he named the Paragon, was discovered by him in a 
field of large red tomato, a variety of all sorts of shapes 
and sizes, except that it was not smooth. Livingston 
observed that this plant was unlike any other in the 
lot. It had distinct characteristics, such as heavy 
foliage, great vigor and prolificness, with uniformity of 
shape, and smoothness of the fruit. But while it had 
all of these desirable qualities, the fruit was not any 
larger than the kind used for preserving, and was there- 
fore too small to be of general market value. 
Basing his judgment on the principle of unity of the 
character of the individual, he selected this plant and 
saved its seed. Selections were made from the seed- 
lings, and this process of selecting and saving seed only 
from the plant which showed an increasé in the size of 
the fruit, in addition to its characteristics, was kept up 
carefully for five years. By the end of that time he 
had succeeded in enlarging the size of the fruit con- 
siderably, and it was then considered worthy of intro- 
duction. 
This was Livingston’s first attempt at plant-breeding, 
and his success with it led him to devote his attention 
to improving the tomato family generally. In the 
course of twenty or more subsequent years, he pro- 
duced through selection a score or more of new types 
of tomato, comprising the best of what are now in 
cultivation. 
