OG STATE FOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



testing:? The testinsr should be done liere, bv this Society and under the 

 rules by which it works. 



We could not look for a commercial orchard at that institution ; it was not 

 needed. AVhat he understood as needed at the State Agricultural College first 

 and above all; was an orchard of sample trees, where, after growing them so 

 that their merits as to growth, foliage, style of treatment, hardiness, and 

 adaptation to the soil, would be perfectly learned in connection with the cli- 

 mate and peculiar locality, they would serve as a standard of comparison for 

 all other orchards in the several fruit-growing districts of the State and their 

 soils. It has been said here that the Legislature was not liberal enough in its 

 appropriations, but we are not in fairy land here, and we feel certain that a 

 great omniscient institution is not likely to rise up in a single night or a single 

 year, even if the Legislature Avere to provide all the millions of dollars it would 

 require. The college has grown solidly and surely; it is firmly planted now; 

 its proportions are far grander now than they w^ere twenty or ten years ago. It 

 takes time to render the several departments thoroughly filled up. We have 

 seen the accommodations of the institution enlarged by the erection of new 

 buildings. AVe have seen the chemical department erected, enlarged, and still 

 further increased. The whole institution, so far as its facilities for agricul- 

 tural instruction have been needed, has reached in some points all that could 

 be expected since its organization. It is now come to a point where its botani- 

 cal and pomological facilities may be attended to, and we hope that they too 

 will be well considered, and that the attempts to increase them will not be be- 

 yond the necessities of the institution. In watching the progress of the College 

 for the past twenty-two years, we have seen that it loses nothing by bearing in 

 mind tiie old latin maxim ^'fesfina Unte'^ of hastening slowly. From its 

 situation it is impossible that it should be the sole arbiter to test, and decide 

 upon the merits of fruit for commerce. A sample orchard with the means it 

 could supply for observation in regard to treatment, and va training skilled 

 pomologists is all that is needed there. Its collections of samples and models, 

 and its records of observation would undoubtedly be made of great service to 

 the orchardists of the country. But for it to undertake to be the sole tester of 

 fruits is an impossibility. The true test is the commercial demand, so far as 

 profit is concerned. Here in this body is the thorough testing place. Here 

 the commercial grower conies to place before us his experience. Here comes 

 the experimenter with his new fruits. Here comes the amateur seeking new 

 and choice varieties ; and here come also all the productions from every dis- 

 trict and from every soil and rano;e of climate from Chebovi^an to Berrien, 

 from Grand Traverse to Monroe, which are originated or have been brought 

 into our State to be judged upon after hearing the experience of all. This is 

 the true place for the experimentum crucis, by which we are to be guided in 

 our decisions as to what is worthy and what is umvorthy, — as to what should go 

 on lists which are worthy of cultivation for profit or pleasure and what is not. 

 If we are to be a great State, noted for the production and su})ply of fruit of 

 the highest quality, and this interest is to be sustained as one of the resources 

 of the State for revenue, we must admit that it is tiie commercial value of 

 what we grow that must be the leading test. A sample orchard may be grown 

 at the College of the very highest value to our fruit interests, better probably 

 there than anywhere, but so far as a test orchard is concerned, every well 

 grown orchard is a test orchard for the soil or locality in which it is grown. 

 Hence it is that we say here is the place, and here the court before which the 



