Man a Creator 53 



plants differed in other respects, too, but this 

 was the most conspicuous dissimilarity: it was 

 named Oenothera gigas. One had the veins of 

 the leaves and the tips of the flower buds tinged 

 deeply with red, and was named O. rubrinervis. 

 These are but samples of the "sports" that 

 were appearing under the very eyes of an 

 expert scientist; de Vries gave to such forms 

 the name of mutants and claimed that such 

 mutations or saltations have been exceedingly 

 important in the evolution of the higher types 

 of animals and plants from their simpler 

 predecessors. New types of plants and animals 

 may appear, then, dut of a clear sky, so to 

 speak. These mutants breed true. The dif- 

 ference between them and the parent form may 

 be great or relatively slight, but they unerringly 

 perpetuate themselves. 



. No American has been more successful in 

 producing new varieties of plants than has 

 Luther Burbank. He has worked largely 

 through the process of hybridization, achieving 

 almost by intuition what the scientific breeder 

 gets by careful study. Burbank undertook 



