Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 78.djvu/558

548 than formerly the dependence of improvement upon the ability to detect and to judge the value of departures from the common types of our commercial plants. This means a greater attention to the study of form and characteristics as a basis of and preparation for work along breeding lines and suggests the need of qualifications of an artistic nature. It was because of natural love for animals and unusual insight into animal life and form that a comparatively few men have been able to establish more than threescore breeds of animals of highest efficiency in the performance of a variety of functions through which the human race is served.

It is not necessary to enumerate the accomplishments of Mr, Burbank. Through the magazines the public has already been given an adequate if not an exaggerated account of the achievements of that wonderful man. It is a matter of immediate concern to every one to know the basis of Mr. Burbank's success. Has he secrets which are to die with him? Or are we to have numerous workers to whom life forces are as plastic clay? Do his accomplishments prove to us the economic value of recent scientific work or do they refer us back to principles and methods always known but lightly regarded in our eagerness to grasp ideas announced as sure to supersede all that has gone before?

The answer to these questions interests the workers among plants, and no less the student of animals, because the laws of inheritance are, to a large extent, alike in both kingdoms. To most biologists and breeders the greatest value of Mr. Burbank's work lies in the light it throws upon inheritance and the encouragement it offers to persons whose natural leanings prompt them to identify themselves with commercial or scientific work with plants or animals.

The best opinion seems to be that the effect of Mr. Burbank's work will not be to revolutionize breeding practise, but that it does mark an important step in the complete adaptation of plants and animals to all the needs of man. It does this by demonstrating what may be done in the light of knowledge that has been always with us, but seldom appreciated.

Professor Kellogg, of Leland Stanford University, a biologist of standing, and quite intimately acquainted with Mr. Burbank and his work, writes of it in these words:

No new revelations to science of an overturning character; but the revelations of the possibilities of accomplishment, based on general principles already known, by an unusual man. No new laws of evolution, but new facts, new data, new canons for special cases. No new principle or process to substitute for selection, but a new proof of the possibilities of the effectiveness of the old