218 TRANSACTIONS OF THE NORTHERN 



be not alarmed ; we work so silently that at your very church doors your 

 devotions will not be marred by our activities. Even at night when you 

 sleep, or on Sunday when you worship, we are silently building up the 

 tissues that shall protect you from winter storms and summer suns, and 

 temper the winds to the shorn lamb. We are constructing material that 

 shall be an ornament to your dwellings, a i)rotection to your harvests, 

 and an essential part o1" your great railroad system." 



Will we reject this munificent offer, or will we with grateful hearts 

 accept it ? Let us wisely do our part, and Nature will rigidly comply 

 with all her promises. In this way the western country can save in a 

 hundred years double the amount of our present national debt, in freights 

 on lumber alone. 



It is said by some or.e of late, that the pAiropean Larch is not so 

 durable as has been represented by writers, who uniformly regard it as 

 the most durable timber known. It is possible that trees of this variety, 

 grown singly in the open field will not last so long as timber grown on 

 poor soil, or in a dense forest, where they grow more slowly. We who 

 have experience with oak and locust know that is the case with them. 

 A post of either of these timbers will not last a fourth as long when 

 taken from a field grown tree as if taken from the forest, 1 have no 

 doubt, therefore, that when we grow larch thickly, and consequently more 

 slowly, it will preserve the character that has been awarded to it by 

 European writers. 



I will add further, that chere are a great many ridges through our 

 country too sandy for profitable farming on which can be grown box-el- 

 der and Scotch pine. I should much prefer the latter. Instead of these 

 unsightly sand hills which now so disfigure the landscape, we should soon 

 see interspersed, all over ©ur country, ridges and knolls of beautiful 

 green, emblems of life instead of death, 



Mr. M. L. Dunlap spoke on the subject of bee-keeping as connected 

 with Horticulture and floriculture in city and suburban homes. It might 

 be inquired, what bee-keeping had to do with these pursuits. He would 

 answer by asking, what was the object to be attained in Horticulture and 

 floriculture. Simply feasts, — feasts of the eye and feasts of the palate, 

 — nothing but feasts. If we can add another feast of the eye and a 

 feast of the palate from the flowers, without detracting from the other 

 feasts that they supply, we have gained just so much, and it is this fact 

 that made bee-keeping a part of Horticulture and of floriculture, and 

 gave it a place in every city and suburban home where these pursuits are 

 carried on. 



Mr. M. B. Spofford read the following paper on growing orchards : 



