Luther Burbank, His Methods and Discoveries and Their Practical Application, Vol. 3

Excerpt from Luther Burbank, His Methods and Discoveries and Their Practical Application, Vol. 3: Prepared From His Original Field Notes Covering More Than 100, 000 Experiments Made During Forty Years Devoted to Plant Improvement

I recall reading an address by the late Professor Newton, a distinguished American astronomer, on the subject of dead work, in which be emphasized the fact that the main bulk of the experiments which any scientific worker must make will lead to no definite goal. A large part of the time of every experimenter must be given up to following trails that lead nowhere in particular or that end in blind cul de sacs.

The work of the plant experimenter is no exception, but there is always an incentive to further effort in the knowledge that a path that seems to lead only into impenetrable mazes may presently bring one out into the light. To make the application to one illustrative case among many, I recall that for twenty-four successive seasons I attempted to hybridize certain species of Solanum before I finally succeeded in effecting a cross that gave me a single seed from which sprang the new race of Sunberries.

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