CHAPTER VI When the time comes for me to leave this good world I shall (Part 1)

CHAPTER VI When the time comes for me to leave this good world I shall be perfectly satisfied with work completed, if success can be counted in only three accomplishments: Professionally — in establishing the fourth era of surgery; Sociologically — in founding the doctrine of cultural limitations in its relation to man: And Horticulturally — in fixing the idea of orchardists making one hundred dollars per year per acre from nut trees grown upon every barren hillside in America which can be made to grow trees of any sort. The conception of the fourth era in surgery came as a result of observations upon effects of the short incision in appendi- citis, but its principles could not be formulated until some years later. A study of the factors which would account for the doub- ling of flowers carried me into an appreciation of that con- tinuity in nature which made the phenomenon clearly analogous to variations occurring in other forms of organic life; indi- cating the nature of limitations of culture which included man in its processes. The idea of covering our barren hillsides with nut trees came as a natural result of experimental work in arboriculture, and the observation that valuable crops of nuts might easily be raised upon land that has been practically abandoned by farmers. It is particularly difficult for a doctor to follow up any sort 343 344 TOMORROW'S TOPICS of constructive work that lies outside of his first-duty responsi- bilities. He must keep his mind unceasingly upon his cases during the months of professional work. He turns cases over and over in mind during the day. The ideas which suddenly come to him in connection with a given case may save that particular patient's life, or at least avert some dan- gerous complication. "There!" sa)rs the doctor, "That's just what I need to do for that man. Glad I thought of it !" His mind must not be upon the stock market, or upon hobbies, or business, or troubles, but ever and always upon his cases. Cases alone — during months of work. Vacation time may be devoted to hobbies, business and troubles, but not the time which belongs to his professional wards. Every one should have some hobby however that will make him prance around the room with joy occasionally ; otherwise he is dragging along through life and just waiting to finish a sort of duty job which he cannot avoid. It is impossible in the midst of active practice to go back among one's old loves among the books, but the doctor can cast a loving glance at the backs of treasures in his library, to his Epictetus, or De Tocqueville, or Cuvier, or Horace, and remember how he enjoyed them once. My impression is that at least two or three years of general practice are really essential for anyone who is to take up special work. In 1889, having determined to devote my pro- fessional work to surgery exclusively, it seemed best at the same time to plan for an ideal professional life and to have a hobby or two for greasing squeaks. There seemed to be pretty good evidence that we have only a short time to live on this earth, and if one cannot have an ideal time here, there's no telling when the next opportunity may come. My plan wa in general to devote a certain part of the time to actual practici and a part of the time to recreation. The idea was obtaine'' TO-MORROW'S TOPICS 345 from somewhere that a man can do a year's work in ten months but not in twelve. Enlarging upon one end of this idea, it seemed best to work continuously for about nine months and to play for three, but the time for continuous work was broken a little. The idea was to devote six days of every week very steadily to professional work, without regard for hours or resting, but the seventh day was to be used for purposes of rest, which consisted commonly during early days of a walking trip of twenty or thirty miles with some friend. The worse the weather the better we liked it. There is hardlv a boulder of magnesian rock, or group of lepidoptera, haunt of car- dinal-bird, hole of opossum, ledge of rattle snake, patch of gentian, or striped-bass channel within thirty miles of New York that we did not find on these resting days. We caught many a trout within city limits, and sometimes, by naughtily making friends with policemen, managed to shoot a few wood- cock within city limits. The plan by the year was to take three months entirely away from actual practice and these three months were sometimes to be devoted to travel in order to visit clinics and see other men at work. They were to include time for experimental work, library work, or a run off on exploring expeditions to different parts of Europe, Asia, Africa or America, for the purpose of shooting, fishing and making observations in natural history (including folks). Incidentally it may be well to remark that some effort was required for determining the sort of natural history work that one can do in vacation time. There are two ways for going at it. The accurate, scientific observer seriously classifying his specimens, and making painstaking avoidance of error, gains the greatest degree of respect. The one who reads as he runs, getting together a good many facts of interest for associative purposes without being distressingly correct in detail, has the most fun. One sort of naturalist does not quite fully approve 346 TO-MORROW'S TOPICS of the other. While venerating and appreciating the accurate scholarly scientist, I could never quite feel that his type of mind had descended to me front heaven. There was more enjoyment to be had by nipping here and there while trotting along, after the manner of a deer, — and a deer has always been held to be a first rate sort of animal. That precedent settled in my mind the question whether it was right to do anything in a half-way manner. Three precedents of inesti- mable value to me when shaping a comfortable life course have been given by the deer with his nipping while nmning; by the guinea-hen with her habit of sitting in the middle of forty eggs, hatching all she can and letting the rest go; by the red squirrel with his life joy in all weathers. While following an arranged plan in life it seemed best not to be painfully con- scientious about continuous work. Sometimes there was temptation to play hookey in the busy season for a week or so of shooting or fishing with friends, and sometimes during the vacation months I would assume professional responsibili- ties for a short time. The ideal plan of life naturally included the thought of having a wife and family at an early date. One might not originally consider this as likely to interfere with three months of vacation. After becoming a husband and father, it was indeed evident that summer months of vacation could not be expended in a life of the free wild rover, and the next best plan seemed to include the idea of a country place near the city where experimental work in horticulture would satisfy a natural love for the stimulus given by astonishing failures and disappointments. At the same time opportunity would be given for out-of-doors exer- cise. Sir Launcelot's Castle having been found and pur- chased, experimental work seemed to run along natural lines of cleavage toward the special study of trees. Such work would be constructive and its end-results of greater value to TO-MORROW'S TOPICS 347 the public than the results of time spent upon even such an excellent game as golf. My prospective ideal life included the plan to retire from practice at the age of sixty-five. That would likely enough give me some twenty years for living a life of vision and of choice. These coupon years could be devoted to experimental work in surgery, in biology and in horticulture. There would be time for attending meetings of learned societies in all parts of the world. Incidentally one might during that time make a couple of million dollars to be applied in experimental work. While engaged in the responsibility of taking charge of cases of human life and happiness it has not seemed right to engage in any occupation which would bring a large income. In the course of exploring and noting the geology of localities, in vacation time, I have incidentally run across valuable ores. One bed of iron ore is of great extent. A much smaller bed which two of us found and reported, is said to have been staked, claimed and sold for several hundred thousand dollars two years later. We did not care to bother with it, for it meant close attention to developing the subject for a year or more. This other bed of ore has not been reported, and will probably not be found by others, because its discovery was due to an accident which is not likely to be repeated for a prospector. It can wait well enough until after I am sixty-five, because no one is much in need for iron meanwhile. When first laying out plans for an ideal life the field of in- come was carefully looked over. Finding that a good deal of time would be required for securing all of the money in the world, it seemed better to take just enough for purposes of comfort, and let the rest of it go. Looking over the field of fame, it seemed better to try to be good rather than great, for although this would require more effort, there was. less to be feared from competition. 348 TO-MORROW'S TOPICS Placing a bit of horticultural work at the end of these notes is rather symbolic of my ideal life, which included the idea of developing an useful recreation which would run along indefinitely into that time in life when it becomes necessary to have aid for a f eebling hand and shaking knee. When professional work is done, with its hurry and responsibility, this other work will fill the days of old age with comfort if not with inspiration. It places something ahead of a man right up to the last minute. The history of my work in hybridizing nut trees is of interest as showing what unexpected trend may take one into fields of observation that he had not anticipated. In 1901 it was my ambition to collect upon the country place (at Stam- ford) all of the American trees and shrubs that could be accli- matized at that latitude. After devoting spare hours for a couple of years to getting together specimens and information, the subject had grown to such great proportions that a decision was made to confine the collection to nut-bearing trees and the conifers. After a couple of years more of experience this division had grown to such unwieldy proportions that it became necessary to confine myself to the study of nut-bearing trees, and this in turn grew so rapidly that one could readily perceive that an entire life might be devoted to the subject of hickories alone, and a man would not comprehend the subject fully even at that. After studying our various species of hick- ories, trying to collect species and varieties in order to cultivate the most desirable ones, it became apparent that the ideal hickory nut was not likely to be found in nature because nature had established mean types too securely. Plans were made for cross-fertilizing the flowers of various species and varieties that approached the ideal, in the hope of developing a large, thin-shelled nut of high quality and a tree that was prolific and precocious in bearing. Experiments in cross-pollenizing the TOMORROW'S TOPICS 349 hickories and other nut trees were begun in 1905. A further study of the subject brought out the fact that varieties of hickories, like varieties of apples, were already so crossed that, in order to get an ideal nut and tree, it would be necessary to cross species rather than varieties. Incidentally I crossed dif- ferent species of walnuts with different species of hickories, and found that the so-called open bud hickories and all of the walnuts seemed to accept each other's pollen, but at the present writing am not sure if true hybrids have resulted. If the crosses prove to be true hybrids the phenomenon had not been previously observed. While engaged in doing this work, ex- periments were made incidentally in attempts at crossing vari- ous hazels with each other, at crossing various chestnuts with each other and with their cousins the beeches and the oaks. It was found that this field offered many possibilities but required more work and tabulation of data than could be managed by a very busy man with complicated responsibilities, who was mak- ing the subject simply one for recreation. So far as I then knew, the subject of crossing nut trees had not been taken up systematically and deliberately by any one else, but it was found later that an occasional experimenter had included some species of nut trees in hybridization work. It may be that many other experimenters had deliberately set out to cross the nut trees, but at the time of the beginning of my experiments, data for guidance were not obtainable, and available literature did not indicate that others were engaged in this work. It was probably just about time in the course of progress for some of us to take up such a subject. As we progress in various fields of observation, one subject after another is taken up by man- kind when the proper time arrives. If I return one hundred years from now horticulturists will perhaps be near the point of injecting into a twig some preparation of malic acid for the purpose of sensitizing ovules of a flower in such a way ^ ifL^jnj^'jtnn wuL arrrpc pnlira not cniy from anodier *jc sgccgS' bat trooi aootber gums or bxoStj'. The reascai w^rr a^mzafcare occapKd ssdf first widi annual plants trees with Cjiilj pfompt and large and dK inatt tree ordiardist made a dban dK man who devoted himself aiirimi cropSh. tne irium\ irom mnicii were comparatively smaS in propoftioo to dv ood^ of moocj, time and labor. The great engine of the not tree vas neglected becanse of the tinK l e tpiiied for sodk trees to a3me into profitable bearing. \llien the not tree finalhr <fid ict e i% c attention in die doe course of progress, not orchards of selected varieties of wahnrts, al- monds, hazds and pecan hi c ko rie s were foond to give large ammal letmns iqion capital invested. Sdection by horticol- tnrists had been made chiefly from dioioe specimens of trees whidi were foond in nature and then propagated by grafting. The idea of developii^ ideal nuts of fine qoality and great food value by a systematic method for breaking up nature's mean types and making new combinations which men want, has been left for hybridizers of the Twentieth Centorv. Nut trees under this treatment may be made to give a larger proportion of food per acre than may be obtained perhaps from any other crop. It certainly has been a great delight to be one of the first to suffer the disappointment, financial loss and hardships that are connected with hybridizing and cultivating nut trees. It is a joy to help prepare the way for others who can profit by one's mistakes and errors. All of the nuts resulting from my efforts at cross pollenizing during the first year of work were lost. Many of them were lost before being collected, because I had not realized how well the squirrels, white-footed mice and other animals which are not so very dtunb knew a good thing when they saw it. After the nuts had been collected some TO-MORROW'S TOPICS 351 of them were stored improperly. They mildewed or dried out, and most of the specimens which were not mildewed were car- ried off by rats and mice which found their way into the boxes where specimens were kept. During the next year of hybridiz- ing, notwithstanding the application of many protective devices, it was nevertheless found that rodents and weevils adapted themselves to my devices with wonderful celerity, and practically all of the resulting nuts were lost, although a few sprouted and grew. I am not afraid to pit my intelligence against that of another man, but I take my hat off to a mouse. Many of the valuable specimens which grew were destroyed later in so many kinds of ways that my sense of humor came to the rescue of disturbed feeling. Nature has learned the lesson for growing ten thousand seeds when only one is apparently required, and that showed the difference between nature and me. In this particular year particular attention had been devoted to the chestnut, for the reason that the chestnut blight threatened to dispose of all our native American sweet chestnuts. Pollen of the American sweet chestnut was placed upon pistillate flowers of certain species which resisted the blight, but crosses were made chiefly upon the chinkapin. At the end of the season there were several hundred beautiful nuts of the cross between American sweet chestnut and chinkapin, and in order to prevent autumn sprouting they were buried deeply in the sand. When taking them up in the following spring they were found to have sprouted nevertheless, and on account of being buried so deeply had mostly perished. Only five nuts sent out sprouts from adventitious buds, but that was a "new thing" for chestnuts to do, and the accident furnished a note of value for botanists. The following year's work resulted in my having several hundred specimens of crossed