744 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



the watchword. Buy them as cheaply as possible from any Jack-leg 

 propagator regardless of whether he gathered his pits from the can- 

 ning factory and cut the scions from the nearest old moss-covered, 

 diseased, fence-row seedling tree. Or stretch out a little and listen 

 to the silver-tongued and golden stories of the tree nomad whose 

 sole possession on earth was a place to get his mail and no hope 

 for the future, and buy of him at a good price, provided he hurries 

 forward the discarded trees collected from some repiltable nursery- 

 man. Then set them in a mere plow-cross because of lack of time 

 to dig holes, start them high for ease of cnltivation, grow corn in 

 them until the starved land will do no more. This, gentlemen, 

 is not an overdrawn picture nor is it confined to isolated cases, but 

 more often the rule. This is not criticism. 



Under this system the evolution of the peach becomes retrogres- 

 sive, augmented and intensified by increasing prices obtained for 

 fruit. As the population increased and the markets broadened by 

 the great transportation companies annihilating distance, we rev- 

 eled then in the thought that we had God's chosen place, and we 

 were the people to grow fruit. You cannot wonder at this w^hen I 

 tell you that 86 cents was the average price. We marvel now as 

 much that such a system was in any degree profitable as we wonder 

 how anything was ever accomplished without the modern appli- 

 ances of business. It can only be explained by the fact that the 

 natural enemies were not present owing to the newness of the in- 

 dustry. Insects and fungi had not appeared to partake of the boun- 

 tiful repast we had prepared for them; but they learned of our gen- 

 erosity and they came by legions, invited their friends and kindreu 

 to forsake their lowly life on weeds and brambles to take a place 

 at the bountiful fruit table spread for them. That this will be 

 the case in the new countries now growing and commencing to 

 grow fruit is possible. To dispute it is to dispute the natural law 

 from man to the lowest insect to supply himself with the best 

 from the nearest and greatest source of supply. We wonder again 

 that we can grow fruit at all with this army of invasion, but all 

 invaders have their periods of prosperity, and comparative ob- 

 scurity, through the agency of their enemies and lack of food 

 supply, as instanced by that dread scourge, the yellows, in its south- 

 ern journey. Striking the Peninsula in the northern part where 

 there was the most orchards and passing on to the lower counties 

 so rapidly that it transferred the peach center from the northern 

 county (New Castle) through Kent, the middle county, to Sussex, 

 the lower one, in a period of twenty years. 



Behind this force of natural results there has been a strong 

 helping hand in the persons of the untiring, ever zealous, far- 

 seeing scientific Avorkers of the agricultural colleges and the strong- 



