J r inter Meeting. 147 



owners are unable to give the trees sufficient care. Ask the farmer 

 which he had rather have, "one" acre of corn well cultivated, or "ten" 

 acres half cultivated, and we need not surmise at his answer ; promptly 

 and emphatically it comes, "One acre well tended." As is the farmer, 

 so should be the prudent fruit man. 



In making a success of the fruit business, much depends upon 

 the varieties we plant as well as the market for which we are plant- 

 ing. If it is a home market, it would perhaps be incumbent upon us 

 to plant an entirely different variety and grade than would we if we 

 were planting for and depending upon a foreign market ; all of these 

 things must be thought of as well as a look into the future and its 

 possible developments and requirements in the fruit line. 



It is not the amount of apples we grow, but it is the quality, and 

 this we can't get in this day and age of fruit growing without thorough 

 ■cultivation, spraying, pruning and thinning. 



I have in mind an orchard of eighty acres, planted two years 

 ago, in a stiff' timothy sod, the owner cutting a crop of hay off of it 

 every 3'ear since ; and he came to me not long since and said to me, 

 ■"Lowmiller, would you advise me to plant that other 80 of mine in 

 fruit, too," and I said to him, don't do it, you go home and plow up 

 that sod and plant corn in your orchard and cultivate it, and you will 

 have all 3^ou can attend to, and more too, and your fruit will be 

 TOO per cent better. 



What we want in the fruit business is men with plenty of hard 

 common sense and a heart that never fails, even though the apple 

 crop does. The thing to do is to hope on, push on, work on and 

 never give up, though adversity stares us in the face and we fail to 

 <xet a good crop of apples every year; don't expect too much from 

 your orchard at first, but coax it and work with it and live with it, 

 and in the near future you will see that your close attention has. 

 made for you a fine orchard that repays you ten-fold. Then you 

 can sit down under your own fig-tree and survey with pride the 

 handiwork of your own hands and brain. 



Yes, eighty acres is enough. 



VARIETIES AND THEIR RESPECTIVE MERITS. 



(A. T. Nelson, Lebanon, Mo.) 



Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : 



The subject our worthy secretary has assigned to me, "Different 

 varieties and their respective merits for South Missouri," is one 

 which I doubt I can do justice to. As I see before me many appje 



