HARDENING AND ADAPTATION 
Mr. Burbank is a loyal Californian, but he 
is also loyal to all the fruit interests of the 
world. From his own catholic point of view 
his mission among men is to do the greatest 
possible good to the greatest possible number 
of the race. 
The following, bearing directly upon the 
subject of adaptation of fruits to other regions, 
is the opinion of a practical fruit- grower of 
California: 
“Mr. Burbank is doing for the East in plum 
culture, what Hale and other peach-growers 
have done for the peach crop. He will 
increase it ten-fold, perhaps a hundred-fold, 
and deprive California, to that extent, of a 
market for her plums. California ships mil- 
lions of boxes of plums to the eastern markets 
annually, and the business is highly profitable. 
Now comes Mr. Burbank and creates new 
plums by the dozens, that bear enormously 
and live and thrive equally well in the frozen 
North, the sunny South or the favoring cli- 
mate of California. Is it not possible that the 
California plum market will go the way of the 
peach market after Mr. Burbank’s plums shall 
have been sufficiently grown in the East? Of 
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