58 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



that they will not be able to sell their number two apples, if 

 this law is enforced, can rest easy that there is a market for 

 their fruit, but if they persist in growing number two grade it 

 must be sold as number two and not as fancy. At Augusta 

 last year we had a good sample of a fancy pack of one of our 

 prominent buyers. The man who circulates such a story 

 among a class of growers who do not understand that the 

 apple law is intended as an uplift to the industry, certainly is 

 no credit to that industry, his state, or nation, in trying to create 

 the prejudice that he may still continue his dishonest methods. 



Our society has made such rapid growth in the past few years 

 that it is impossible with our present funds, to keep up the 

 past high standard of our meetings and perform all the vari- 

 ous committee work without assistance from the cities we visit, 

 and while it has been freely given in the past, it places your 

 officers in an unenviable position and bars us from visiting 

 some places where the fruit industry would be much benefited. 

 I therefore suggest requesting the legislature to increase our 

 stipend to two thousand dollars. I am firmly convinced in 

 making this suggestion that standing committees of this soci- 

 ety can in time rectify many existing evils. As an illustration 

 look at the tremendous increase in ocean freights on apples in 

 the last few years, an increase worse than injustice. 



Look at the arbitrary rates of the M. C. R. R. on the so- 

 called "freezer" cars, a special rate of three dollars per car to 

 Portland and five dollars to Boston on apples, while cream and 

 other commodities are carried at regular tariff rates. We surely 

 are not making an unreasonable request and in a State where the 

 fruit industry is so important, the State should give freely to 

 assist such work in every legitimate channel. 



Your officers had hoped at this meeting to be able to set a 

 standard of sizes to assist the judges in awarding prizes, and 

 while we have procured much valuable data, we did not feel 

 that we had sufficient to add to our rules and rather than com- 

 mit an exhibitor to an injustice, preferred deferring same for 

 further consideration. 



A very large per cent of the fruit raised at Highmoor Farm 

 is Ben Davis and it certainly, as a rule, is not a good business 

 proposition to dispose of them early in the season. Here the 

 storage question is again a serious matter and our member of 



