GENERAL METHODS OF WORK 
rich in varied opportunities for initial selec- 
tion. Out of this initial selection he makes 
final choice of the best. 
Sometimes he has marked out a certain 
line of life for a flower. He has bred and se- 
lected to that end. For a time all goes as he 
had planned, but suddenly a new trait de- 
velops, something which completely throws all 
former plans out of gear. He does not aban- 
don the test, but watches with the intensest 
interest the new development. If the plant 
persists in its way,—and the new way is 
better,— he leaves the old and follows the new. 
No man is quicker to give up, when convinced 
that giving up is best. But he is not con- 
vinced easily ;— the evidence against him must 
be unanswerable. Now and then out of the 
muck of some slum, reeking with moral filth, 
and developing with unwholesome rapidity 
the seeds of anarchy and crime, a white, pure 
life springs up, persists, maintains its guard 
against all temptations, comes back, mayhap, 
in later years to help redeem its birthplace. 
And so ina similar way a flower sometimes 
breaks away from the line of life all logic and 
reason would say it should follow. 
33 
