"The carnation, as we see it today, was not always such a perfect blossom--no, it is a development of the modest little old-fashioned pink. Men everywhere are devoting their attention to the betterment of things in the vegetable and animal world. We are constantly bringing forth more splendid cattle and horses and sheep, through cultivation; Luther Burbank and his followers are giving us each year more perfect vegetables and fruits and flowers, through scientific cultivation. Here, for example, we find in a northern state a plum tree bearing fruit such as no other northern tree ever produced before. We ask the nurseryman how it is possible to transplant this fruit from a warmer zone to the region of rigorous Winters. He replies that this tree was not brought from a warmer locality, but that it grew here from the beginning. How, then, can it be made to produce such big, splendid plums when no other tree in the neighborhood grows such luscious fruit? [Illustration: Fig. 112] "Here is the explanation: The tree was found growing wild in the woods. [Draw the branch of Fig. 112 in brown and the leaves in green.] And there in the woods it produced only very small, sour plums. [Complete Fig. 112 by drawing the plums in purple or a combination of red and blue.] But with this hardy tree to work on, the fruit experts, through grafting and cultivation, have caused it to bring forth this large, luscious fruit. [With purple, or a combination of red and blue, enlarge the plums, completing Fig. 113.] These men knew what to do and they did it. If they hadn't done it, the tree, worthless and neglected, would still bear little, sour plums instead of big, sweet ones. [Illustration: Fig. 113] "Mothers, the nursery of your home is like the nursery where the fruit experts do their wonderful work. God has placed in your keeping these little ones. You are the expert whose business it is to see that as they grow older they will not bear the small, sour fruit of wrong living, but the large, sweet fruit of Christian service. What they are to be depends upon _you_. The plum tree in the woods could not grow better of itself. _It had to have help._ And yet, we find mothers everywhere who seem to think that the child can develop into a high type of manhood and womanhood if he is provided with a plenty to eat and wear and with the public school and the Sunday school at his disposal. "Within the heart of each mother God has implanted a natural knowledge of how to care for the child. To fail to apply this knowledge is to fail to reach up to a parent's highest privilege.