No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 509 



this evening, and my coming in at the tail end made the evening 

 seem a little long to me. One of the disappointments or lack of 

 pleasure of interest that came to me is this, when one is expected to 

 say something, it takes the edge out of it somewhat, as the man 

 whose good wife lay dying, and she was satisfied to go, and she took 

 John by the hand and said, "I am sorry to go, but 1 am not going 

 to place any restrictions upon you, except one little request; at my 

 funeral just ride in the carriage with mother." John immediately 

 replied, "Yes, Mary; yes, but it will destroy the pleas.ure of the day 

 for me." So to appear here at this late hour has taken one of the 

 pleasures of the day out of me. 



The subject that has been assigned to me is a pretty broad one. 

 Your Secretary asked me to speak on the subject of peach culture, 

 tillage and marketing, but I won't go into all those features of it. 

 There is so much that might be said and so far reaching in its effect, 

 that a good deal will have to be left out for questions that may be 

 asked hereafter. The growth of the peach in America, commer- 

 cially, is a comparatively new enterprise; that is, when you take into 

 consideration the extensive scale in which they are now grown. The 

 old commercial peach growing was only in a few favored places 

 in the United States, and that was in Delaware and New Jersey, 

 and some in Michigan. At one time those places were supposed 

 to be about the only "peach region" in America, and the season 

 was a very short one. The marketing of peaches in New Jersey 

 was about three or four weeks, and then they were gone; so in 

 Michigan, they were used mostly for canning purposes, and were 

 bought up practically for the purpose of canning, and for the pur- 

 pose of a local supply, as well as in other sections of the country 

 where they could be grown, but on the whole they were the particu- 

 lar sections from which they could be shipped to other places in a 

 commercial way. Now, there is a '"season" of six moDths or more 

 of the peach market in America. This has come about through 

 various reasons. One was that which Prof. Warren touched on, 

 the increased appreciation of fruit as a food product. Fruit was 

 once a sort of luxury, as the j'ears have gone by. By loolcing up 

 fruit growing statistics in New England, the records of the Massa- 

 chusetts societies, and other societies, seem to show that the early 

 planting by the Plymouth and Jamestown colonies in connection 



' with the fruit were simply for the purpose of making something to 

 drink out of their fruit. But now we know as a staple article of 

 food, fruit has been steadily increasing in use and value, and I think 

 the organizations which you have so largely introduced in Pennsyl- 

 vania, New Y'ork and New England, known as the Grange, have 

 had much to do with encouraging the fruit as food idea, the Ooddess 



~Pomona constantly reminding us that fruit is the one food that 

 comes from the hand of God without any preparation or cooking, 

 and that is something to stimulate us to a daily use of fruit. 

 The demand for the peach as a healthy food has been one of the 

 prime causes for its increased use six months of the year. 



Another prime cause for its extensive use is the character of ad- 

 vertising and the displaying of fruits, as we all observe in our for- 

 eign friends, who put on the fruit stands the very best fruit obtain- 

 able, and they make it show better than anyone else; and now, we 

 have not only the fruit dealer, but the grocery man, in the large 



