Addresses — Humbugs. 157 



Speaking of substitution, I think there is a great deal of harm 

 done in that way. I was speaking with a gentleman a short time 

 ao-o; I think it was in reference to selling the Alaska crab, -which 

 has had a great run through this country. He said when they filled 

 his order they substituted Astrachan and Briar Sweet for it. I told 

 him I did not think there was any nurseryman that had the cheek 

 to do that. "Yes," he said, "there's a man in Janesville by the 

 name of Kellogg that did it. 



Mr. Field — There have been a great many ideas suggested by 

 this paper of Mr. Kellogg's, and he gives us a great deal on that 

 subject every year, but I want to ask Mr. Kellogg and this conven- 

 tion if it does not do us good sometimes to be humbugged; if it 

 does nut sharpen us in business transactions. If a man can come 

 on to my farm and humbug me, and do it handsomely, I like to 

 have him do it. He cannot do it the second time. It makes me 

 sharper. It makes me more suspicious of these very individuals. 

 It sets me to thinking. I say to myself, "If another man coxes 

 along, as one did last summer, and says, ' Have you been troubled 

 with these tree peddlers?' ' Xo, sir, I have not.' 'Has not one 

 called on you?' 'Yes, there has been a dozen here, but I do not 

 allow them to trouble me. I am glad to see you all; I am glad to 

 talk with you, and I think I know what I want. If you have got 

 what I want now, I will buy it of you; if you have not, 1 won't. I 

 think I know what I want.*' But there is too much of this humbug 

 in the world. Go into a store in Madison, or anywhere else, and 

 ask for a certain thing, and if the keeper has not got it, it is ten 

 chances to one if the clerk does not say to you, " My dear sir, -we 

 have not got that, but we have got something that will suit you 

 better." I went into a store the other day -where they said so to 

 me. I said, " I know what I want a great deal better than you do; 

 if you have got that, show it to me, and if you have not, say so." 

 Of course he said he had not got it. Now we who live in the country, 

 and have no opportunity of buying what we want except of these 

 men you call tramps, ought to know -what we want. If we do not, 

 it is all right to get bit once in a -while. It will make us sharper. 



I do not blame Mr. Plumb or Mr. Kellogg, or anybody else, for 

 going out and selling what they have got, if they do it fairly and 

 honestly, and do not bring around their fruits in jars that magnify 

 forty or fifty times, like the jar with Judge Bryant's gold-fish in, 



