His first task was to find work, but as few people at that time lived in the region, jobs were hard to get. In speaking of this period of his life, Mr. Burbank says: "One day I heard that a man was building a house. I went to him and asked him for the job of shingling it. He asked me what I would do it for. The regular price was two dollars and a half a thousand, but I was so anxious for the work that I offered to do it for one dollar and seventy-five cents. 'All right,' he said, 'come and begin tomorrow.' But I had no shingling hammer and all the cash I had in the world was seventy-five cents, which I at once expended in purchasing the necessary hammer. Next morning when I reached the job, my new hammer in hand, all ready to go to work, I was surprised and--what shall I say--dismayed, to find another man already at work, while the owner calmly came to me and said, 'I guess you'll have to let that job go, as this man here has undertaken to do it for one dollar a thousand.' "How disappointed I was! I had spent my last cent, had a hammer that was no use to me now, and no job. But I kept a stiff upper lip and work soon came, and I've never been so hard up since." Mr. Harwood in describing this period in the life of Mr. Burbank says: "The man who was to become the foremost figure in the world in his line of work, and who was to pave the way by his own discoveries and creations for others of all lands to follow his footsteps, was a stranger in a strange land, close to starvation, penniless, beset by disease, hard by the gates of death. But never for an instant did this heroic figure lose hope, never did he abandon confidence in himself nor did he swerve from the path he had marked out. In the midst of all he kept an unshaken faith. He accepted the trials that came, not as a matter of course, not tamely, nor with any mock heroism, but as a passing necessity. His resolution was of iron, his will of steel, his heart of gold; he was fighting in the splendid armor of a clean life." As a result of his industry, in a few years, Mr. Burbank was able to buy four acres of land where he started a nursery. From the first this enterprise was successful. Upon this plot he built a modest home where he still resides. Here, and on a larger plot a few miles distant, all his remarkable experiments have been made. Before we learn more about his achievements I am sure we should like to become better acquainted with the man. Suppose, then, we invite Professor Edward Wickson of the University of California, who knows him well, to tell us about him.