THE SHASTA DAISY 
botanists of his generation. The two men were 
in deep consideration of some of the most 
profound processes of Nature, when de Vries 
made some remark in which there was a sug- 
gestion of the unreliability of Nature. 
“You are wrong! Dr. de Vries,” Burbank 
instantly replied with great earnestness, ignor- 
ing for the moment all scientific topics in 
order to come to the defense of his vast friend; 
“you are all wrong; Nature never lies. We 
may sometimes misunderstand her, we may 
not always be able to speak her language or 
properly translate her thoughts, but Nature 
never lies.” 
The great botanist sat some time in silence, 
and then gravely nodded his head. 
There were many flowers upon the green 
hills around his boyhood home that the lad 
loved, violets and asters; the royal goldenrod ; 
that soft breath of the spring, the delicate anem- 
one; roses and lilies and the trailing arbutus in 
their seasons; but there was one flower in 
which he took a particular interest, possibly 
because every man’s hand was against it. This 
was the little wild field daisy, to many a 
farmer an unmitigated evil, a pest to be fought 
131 
