mention that to show that without any great flourish of trumpets, but simply by 
the ordinary processess of fertilization, selection and propogation, as to this par- 
ticular flower, others are accomplishing what is said to be a marvellous achieve- 
ment by Mr. Burbank. 
The English people, particularly the Kew authorities, attracted by the noise 
and furor in the magazines, and seeing that the American people were not suffi- 
ciently appreciative of Burbank and that the great catalogue houses were rather 
chary of offering these wonders, and thinking that perhaps it was the old story 
of the prophet without honor in his own country, wrote to Burbank and asked 
him if he would sell or exchange some of these various marvels which he was sup- 
posed to have. I quote his letter in reply : 
‘‘May 8, 1905. 
My dear sir: — Your esteemed note of April 10th received. I am sorry to 
say that the Press has gotten hold of my work a little too soon. I have a great 
number of hybrid thornless cactus, but it takes time and thought to select the ones 
which are to be winners, and I have been obliged to make an invariable rule 
never to send out anything until it is properly finished.” 
Then I thought of the Shasta Daisies that we hoed out : 
“The perpetual poppy and fragrant Dahlia will probably be sent out by a 
Chicago firm next season. The ‘Pomato’ will not be ready for a year or two.” 
This “Pomato,” is a cross between the potato and the tomato, they belong 
to the same family and so will cross; it has been done before; I think it is just 
sixteen years ago last summer since E. S. Carman, in a paper read before the 
Society of American Florists in Boston, told how he had effected this cross. It 
was of no particular use. Of course, Mr. Burbank may make use of it, but as 
an achievement it is nothing. 
“The coreless-apple fraud is none of my work ; I must add that it is no doubt 
worthless ; though I have known it for forty years. 
“I shall be pleased to exchange with you when I have these ready for intro- 
duction.” 
My object in injecting this letter is to show that while these things are 
probably in existence, yet as far as being of any economic value or being on the 
market, as most of us were led to believe, they were not available at that particular 
time. 
The cactus is mentioned there. If there is any one plant attributed to Mr. 
Burbank that has seemed to catch the popular fancy more than another, it is the 
Spineless Cactus. I think I have heard more of that than anything else — to think 
that a man could by manipulation take that miserable thing, that you could not 
even look at without feeling hurt, and breed all those thorns off of it, so that you 
might sit down on it if you wanted to. I never crossed the desert myself except on 
a railroad train, but I can imagine that if a man is crossing the desert and wants 
to sit down, how handy it would be to have one of these thornless cacti handy. 
I want to say in all seriousness that so far as I know, the original plant which 
Burbank had was given to him right straight out of the Department of Agricul- 
ture. Harwood in these magazine articles distinctly credits Burbank with 
