188 PENOBSCOT AND AROOSTOOK UNION SOCIETY. 



ready to plow up. In that way a rotation of pasturing, grain and 

 grass would bo produced, which would be attended with but little 

 labor, and when connected with the sale of wool in the spring, and 

 lambs in the fall, would be very profitable. Of the diiTerent breeds 

 different opinions exist. Some prefer those producing fine, high 

 priced wool, growing on small tender sheep ; others those producing 

 long coarse wool, large, hardy and valuable for mutton. 



Another branch of farming, in my opinion may be made highly 

 profitable, which is, pork raising. By raising a large quantity of 

 roots, to mix with buckwheat, oats and peas to feed to swine and 

 furnish them all the materials they can convert into manure, the 

 farm may be brought to a high state of fertility. There are many 

 other ways to make farming profitable. Perhaps fruit growing 

 would be quite as jjrofitable according to the outlay, as either of 

 the preceding. It is now abundantly proved that fruit trees will 

 flourish here as well as elsewhere. Trees further south, have suf- 

 fered much more by cold winters than ours. Apples grown here 

 will keep two or three months longer than the same varieties grown 

 in Massachusetts, which will always insure us a high price. Large 

 fair apples are valuable for drying ; the price is annually rising, and 

 they are of easy transportation. Many object to planting an or- 

 chard, because they say native trees produce poor fruit, and grafted 

 ones are not hardy. But 1 know the facts are otherwise ; my grafts 

 are more hardy than natives ; I hav-e over one hundred varieties 

 grafted, some of which are as hardy as the trees of the forest, and 

 very productive. If every farmer within the limits of this Society 

 would plant and cultivate large orchards of grafted apple trees, and 

 take proper care of them, in ten years the}'^ would be a source of 

 great profit. If you want good health and light doctors' bills, plant 

 an orchard and take care of it ; no other employment will insure 

 such happiness ; for it was selected by Infinite Wisdom for man's 

 primeval bliss. If a good collection of fruit trees and shrubs were 

 planted on every farm, it would greatly increase the happiness and 

 comfort of many families. Their sons would be less likely to leave 

 their homes discontented, as many now do. How often young 

 men collect all their means — the hard earnings of many years — and 

 start for the great West. They hear of this, or that young man 

 who went there and made his fortune in the rise of land, and they 

 think they can do the same ; entirely ignorant and unacquainted 

 with the deceptions of wicked men, elated with the prospect of 

 success, they start for the promised laud. How often are they 



