222 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



millions of common things that God scatters so lavishly, so freely, on 

 every hand? 



Pardon me if I have spoken earnestly; but, friends, I once knew of a 

 child born into a communit^y of deaf and dumb people. It grew up and 

 was supposed to be deaf and dumb. It had no chance to use those senses, 

 and, like those about it, learned to depend upon others. It was not till 

 a friend who could hear visited the family, that it was discovered that the 

 child could hear, and it soon learned to talk as well as any one. What a 

 crime it would have been to have let that child grow up as a deaf mute! 

 Yet are you less blamable if you let the sense of beauty, with which your 

 child is born, die out because of neglect? 



"He prayeth best, who loveth best, , 



All things, both great and small; 

 For the good Lord, who loveth us, 

 Hath made and loveth all." 



DISCUSSION. 



Dr. 5eal: When I was a boy I used to like to hunt squirrels, rabbits, 

 and such things so well that I would take my gun out to the woods and 

 shoot a few squirrels while the rest were at their dinners or resting, and 

 then I would return with them to the harvest field and think I had had 

 great sport. Since then I have learned to study botany and zoology, and 

 my pleasure in hunting has disappeared. I have something better. I have 

 friends who, every time they get a little tired, spend several weeks up 

 north, fishing for trout or shooting deer. It seems to me — maybe it isn't 

 the thing for me to say — but it seems to me that I have reached a little 

 higher point in enjoyment. 



I don't brag about it, but I have had the opportunity to study these 

 things, and it has taught me to enjo}' the things right around me — trees 

 and shrubs and little animals. If I am obliged to wait for hours in the 

 day time at a depot, for instance, it is not tiresome. I can walk up and 

 down the track and find pleasure in studying the weeds and find new vari- 

 eties of plants. I can go out into the woods and swamps, and all my 

 troubles are lost for the time. I am overwhelmed with the beauty on 

 every side. It seems to me, as Prof. Tracy says, we are often likely to 

 lose sight of some of these things. I wish to speak of a subject in which 

 most, perhaps, take little interest — something about trees and shrubs 

 and forestry. When I was a boy, teaming up and down the roads hero, 

 to Adrian, the old men who helped clear off this timber said, "The timber 

 is growing scarcer. After awhile we will not have enough for firewood. 

 There wont be enough for the railway engines." We have now found 

 coal, and wood isn't so high now as it was a few years ago. We wondered 

 what we would do for railway ties, after the forests were cut off, but we 

 shall use steel. We can dispense with the use of trees to a great extent. 

 But notwithstanding this, trees will always be useful for ornamentation 

 and also for timber for furniture and many other things. I notice, as I 

 pass around the country, that many are interested in preserving some 

 of this timber. I don't advocate tearing up good land and planting out 

 trees, neither argue keeping trees for trees' sake. I wish to make use of 

 them when they are ready to cut, as much as the man who raises trees for 

 other purposes, but once upon a time this Avas a fine timber state. I 



