38 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



have to say gladly that no State, not even Illinois, with an appropriation of 

 $25,000 for horticulture, can compare in variety, quality or quantity of choice 

 fruits on the tables. 



KEEPING UP THE DISPLAY. 



Our success in the future with this display depends upon this Society as it 

 has in the past, and I am sorry that we have not a greater number in attendance^ 

 that a little enthusiasm might be awakened in the collection and forwarding of the 

 fruits this summer to keep up this display. But say you, "we have nothing and 

 will have nothing that will be worthy of exhibiting on the tables of such a show 

 as the one in Chicago." 



You know the story of the clerk in the store when his master asked him if he 

 could sell goods, and made answer, "yes, sir, I can sell goods to any one who 

 wants to buy." "But," said the master, "it is not those who want to buy and 

 will buy that I want a clerk to sell goods to, but it is those who do not want to buy 

 that I want you to reach." Also, you know the story of the owner of the mill who 

 questioned the miller who applied for a situation, "can you make good flour?" 

 "Yes, sir, if I have good wheat I can make as good flour as any one " "But any 

 one can do that," replied the owner. "I want some one who can make good flour 

 out of poor wheat." 



You see the application. We want some extra specimens of fruits this sum- 

 mer, and you answer that you could get them if the fruits were only good, but they 

 are so poor. Any one could get good specimens when orchards are full of them, 

 but we want good specimens when orchards are not full of even poor specimens. 

 They can be found in the State, and it is to be your work to find them and send 

 them to Chicago to the Missouri Exhibit, Horticultural building, Jackson park. 



Now then, if the thousand correspondents and members of this Society will 

 each spena one day only in collecting these fruits, what a work will be done. 



ALL MUST HELP. 



If you collect only a bushel of fruit each, see what we will have to use. If 

 you have to go a long distance to find them, go and get .them ; if you know or hear 

 of any good orchards and cannot go, write me at once so 1 can go or send some one 

 after them. This is our golden opportunity, and no member or fruit-grower in the 

 State can afford to fail of his duty for maintaining the honor of his State. On 

 you depends the success of this tff'ort Directions and shipping tags will be fur- 

 nished to all, and I have had occasion to make arrangements with the State Board 

 of Agriculture to publish this call in an edition of 50,000 copies, which will go 

 broadcast all over our State. On you, individually, will rest the responsibility 

 of our success. 



THE CAUSE OP FAILURES. 



I cannot forbear to mention the success of fruit-growing and on what it 

 depends. Our orchard failures, what causes them ? The cold storms of one year ago 

 blasted the prospect of afine crop in a few diys, and ;not only destroyed the crop, 

 but badly injured the trees, so that they did not recover in time to form fruit-buds 

 for this year's crop, for our fruit-buds are formed in June, and, that time past, 

 our crop is gone for the next year. Even where the injury was not great and the 

 bioom still formed in abundance, the exact repetition of the cold storm at the most 

 critical time has again destroyed the crop more or less ; in some places very badly, 

 worse than last year, indeed; in others not so badly. 



The years '92 and '93 will be long remembered by the fruit-growers as very 

 disastrous ones, but proper care, the use of ashes, lime, salt, ground bone, and in 

 some instances green or barnyard manure, will bring out our younger trees in good 



