GENERAL METHODS OF WORK 
is in process of development at once, hundreds 
of varieties. But it is years in almost every 
case before the end is reached,—so slow the 
work of selection from year to year, this eter- 
nal choosing of the best plants from the best. 
And there are many obstacles. When two 
plants are united to produce a third, no human 
intelligence can predict just what will follow. 
You have in the hollow of your hand a dozen 
seeds from one of your choicest apples. It had 
reddened in the autumn sun on a tree you had 
known since boyhood. You had watched it 
blossom in pink beauty in the springtime of 
other years, had seen its fruit develop in the 
mellowing summer, had watched its bare 
branches tossed in the gale when the winter 
snows lay deep at its feet. Here in your hand 
lie the seeds of this apple. It may be you are 
a thousand miles away from the old home 
where the apple tree is growing. It would be 
a rare delight for you, transplanted to another 
region, and for your children after you, to raise 
another tree from the seeds of the old friend. 
So you plant your twelve seeds to rear on a 
new soil the old friend, and not one of them 
comes into a life in any particular like the 
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