No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 547 



I would suggest that our Legislative Committee examine very care- 

 fully the proposed amendments to our game laws, which have been 

 prepared by the State Sportsmen's Association, and will be presented 

 to the Legislature for adoption this winter. It is highly important 

 that the property rights of the farmer should be protected. We 

 should see that no law is passed which takes from the farmer the 

 right to protect his crops at all times from their enemies, whether 

 in the form of beast, bird or man, and no one is so competent to deter- 

 mine who are his friends and who his enemies as the farmer himself. 



I will now close by extending to you a very cordial invitation to 

 our Centennial Celebration, which will be held on January 19, 1959. 



THE PRESIDENT : I am glad to say that we have with us one of 

 our oldest ex-members — one who needs no introduction, but whom I 

 am glad to present to you — Prof. S. B. Heiges. 



ADDRESS OF PROF. HEIGES. 



I little expected when I left the mild climate of Virginia that 1 

 should be honored by being presented to you as the oldest member of 

 the Association. I feel as if I were the youngest man standing 

 among you. 



It certainly affords me great pleasure to be with you once more. 



I have come for two purposes for the purpose of seeing again the 



older members of the Association, with whom I have met in earlier 

 years, and also for the purpose of looking into the faces of the younger 

 members who have taken up the fight. It is with a feeling of great 

 pleasure, and also of great sorrow that I appear before you to-night. 

 My heart M'ould be a heart of ice or adamant if it did not respond 

 promptly to the old, warm hand-shakes, and the warm greetings that 

 I received here this afternoon. Many of the older members have 

 gone over to the other side. The Bard of Avon puts into the mouth 

 of Mark Anthony at the bier of Julius Cresar the words : ''Tlie evil 

 that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their 

 bones ;" but of these older members who have departed, I have known 

 nothing but good. There is no class of men more honest, more 

 honorable, more truthful than fruit growers. The very nature of their 

 occupation makes them so. 



I have not come here with any set speech ; I have merely come to 

 take you by the hand, those of you who are my old friends, and to 

 meet the new ones, and I want to recall to your memory some of the 

 older friends and members who have passed away. If I have omit- 

 ted any, it is simy)ly because my time has been too brief to do more 

 than glance over the history of the Association since its organiza- 

 tion. 



The first meeting of this Association was held in the city of Lan- 

 caster half a century ago; I was not present, but I had the pleasure 

 afterwards of meeting the first president. Dr. Eshleman. A truer, 

 more genuine, better man never lived. He was followed by Mr. A. 

 W. Harrison, of Philadelphia, a man whom I knew well. The third 

 president of the Association was Mr. R. A. Crider, of Bethlehem. 



