352 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



ends. We aim to develop among our people a keener taste for fruits, flowers 

 and vegetables, and a more intimate knowledge of their variations and peculi- 

 arities and adaptability to a wide range of purposes, knowing that a lively 

 satisfaction will accompany the acquirement of this knowledge. 



We claim as a part of our work the dissemination of information concerning 

 tne outward embellishment of homes; the adaptation of nature's choicest pro- 

 ductions to the adornment of home premises as a work of art. And so we, so 

 far as we succeed in interesting people in the development of an artistic home 

 so that they shall love this spot of soil more than any other, so that removal 

 never so small a distance either way would be considered a calamity ; we have 

 a right to claim for our work a moral and political significance. The spirit of 

 unrest so characteristic of our western life, is combatted by associations like 

 ours. We seek by creating an interest in the products of horticulture that 

 subserve the physical and aesthetic yearnings of man, to awaken in him so 

 earnest a desire for ownership in those that appeal most strongly to his nature 

 that he will gather them about him, make them a part or his life, and add 

 measurably to the satisfaction of living in this world. I need not tell you 

 that this love of the garden and the lawn, respect for the beautiful and noble 

 in trees, enthusiasm over the newer developements of flowers and shrubs, has 

 a stronger hold in the older parts of our country than with us. And that it is 

 where organizations have been established in these interests that we find the 

 most delightful attractions that horticulture can bring to give character to 

 home life. 



I know you will not be satisfied unless I go more into the details of what 

 our society can do for our city and vicinity. So let me epitomize as follows: 

 First, a knowledge of varieties of fruits, their qualities and uses for various 

 purposes, aside from the satisfaction it brings to the consumer, is a safeguard 

 against imposition. Many people who purchase quantities of fruits every year 

 have no conception of quality as distinguishing varieties and are in entire 

 ignorance of the very best, when they would gladly pay for it if they knew a 

 demand for it wOuld secure it. Hundreds of people are eating Baldwin and 

 Ben Davis apples, laboring under the false impression that they are pretty 

 good, when the connoisseur knows as compared with the best apples they are 

 scarcely fit for the palate, and this applies as truthfully to all other fruits as 

 the apple. Ladies order the best fruits from their grocers receiving varieties 

 that are beautiful, delicious dessert fruits, and wonder why, when they get the 

 best, the cooking fails ; totally oblivious of the fact that the very best dessert 

 fruits are usually unfitted for cooking purposes. 



Second, the most delicate and delicious products of horticulture are rarely 

 grown by the rnarketmen, because they are unprofitable. A knowledge of what 

 they are and how to grow them is information of great importance to those 

 who desire to have about them the very best things that horticulture can 

 afford. 



Third, a horticultural society if rightly supported will teach people what to buy, 

 when to buy it, and how to treat it. A majority of our people who have homes 

 about which they desire to gather the choicest fruits, flowers, trees, and shrubs, 

 put themselves totally in the hands of strangers, who know as little about it 

 as they themselves. It is a case of the "blind leading the blind," only one of 

 the parties has enough of an eye for business to get away with the money of 

 his doubly blind neighbor. 



Fourth, people acquire a knowledge of art after long study and favorable 



