STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 51 



prophets often borrowed their imagery from the vine, the oak, the 

 olive, the fir and the cedar. Daniel walked beneath the Hanging 

 Gardens of Babylon. He who said, ''Suffer little children to come 

 unto me," gave from the fields the parables of the fig-tree, the mus- 

 tard seed and the sower. Looking up from the blossoms at his feet 

 into the faces of his disciples, he said, '-Consider the lilies how they 

 grow ; they toil not, neither do they spin." "If God so clothe the 

 grass of the field, which to-da}- is, and to-morrow is cast into the 

 oven, shall he not much more clothe you, ye of little faith?" 

 Paul tauo:ht the resurrection lo the refined Corinthians under the fis;- 

 ure of the sowing of a seed, and the beloved disciple saw in the 

 vision on Patmos, "the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of 

 fruits, and yielded her fruit every month : and the leaves of the tree 

 were for the healing of the nations." 



Our race was born in a garden, "to keep and to dress it." We are 

 making a garden of the world, and to paradise, the garden of God, 

 we are destined. 



To his inheritance in the world's wealth of thought, and to a true, 

 ever-radiating life, I know of no better introduction for the child, 

 than his own little garden. 



After the reading of this essay a fine musical selection was ren- 

 dered by a male quartette, consisting of Prof. George C. Purington, 

 Rev. C. H. Pope, Mr. C. A. Allen and Mr. H. H. Rice. Following 

 this a sketch showing the influence of flowers in the home, written 

 bj' Mrs. Addie S. B. Weston, was, in her absence, reai b3' Mrs. Love 

 N. Ames of Farmington. 



INFLUENCE OF FLOWERS IN THE HOME. 

 By Mrs. Addie S. B. Weston. 



*'Were I in churchless solitudes remaining, 

 Far fi'om all voice of teachers and divines, 

 My soul would find, in flowers of God's ordaining. 

 Priests, sermons, shrines!'' 



Deacon John Thompson owned the largest orchard of small fruits 

 and the most beautiful flower garden in town. Everv one admitted 

 that, and also, that it was all the work of his wide-awake, ambitious 

 daughter, Huldah, who had brought about this desirable transforma- 

 tion within the once neglected, old garden, with its rows of straggling 

 currant bushes and rank stretches of parsley weeds and witch grass. 



