STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



INTRODUCTION. 



It is due to the Executive Board of this Society, that the member- 

 ship should be informed of some of the causes which liave operated to 

 delay the publication of this volume. 



In the first i)lace the Society had not sufficient funds in the treas- 

 ury to publish its annual volume of Transactions, and, as was generally 

 conceded, the Board must, in consequence, await the action of the 

 General Assembly in re-organizing the Society, so as to constitute it a 

 " Corporation of the State," and appropriating funds for its maintain- 

 ance. It was not until the latter part of February that I learned, 

 through the State Auditor, that, by " a recent decision of the Supreme 

 Court," the Society was entitled to its hitherto uniform appropriation of 

 two thousand dollars — under the provisions of the old constitution. 



The contract was then at once made for the publication and de- 

 livery of the volume by the tenth of May, but during the progress of 

 the work the publishers — who had lost their all in " the great confla- 

 gration," and had not yet succeeded in establishing their business upon 

 a sure financial basis — were compelled to go into bankruptcy. This dis- 

 aster caused still further delay ; yet through the kind assistance and 

 perseverance of Mr. C. F. Brewster, a member of the firm, the work 

 has been pushed to completion much sooner tlian the hindrances 

 seemed to indicate could be done. 



The disastrous effect of the unprecedented cold of last winter has 

 cast a gloom over almost the entire peach-growing region of the State ; 

 but this calamity is not so truly discouraging as the fact that at the 

 time, above all others in the liistory of this Society, when persistent 

 research and experiments are imperatively demanded, to ascertain and 

 prevent the causes of disasters to trees and fruits, our representatives 

 in Springfield should refuse to place our Society in a position to enable 

 it to continue its good work and to aid it, by a small appropriation, in 

 publishing, for the benefit of the whole State, the results of its labors. 



