FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 277 



from you. You had better not quarrel with hiua about that; let him 

 make some money, but ask him to make you some. No matter what the 

 commission man says, the buyer has come to the point that he 

 will not believe a thing until he knows it. Do not think you 

 can fool a man on South Water street. When he has. bought a grower's 

 stock three or four or half a dozen times and it is all right, he is going to 

 see if he can find it when he wants more, and he is willing to pay the dif- 

 ference; he finds more satisfaction and commission in handling it and he 

 is not going to steal if he has a little bit of sense, and many of them have 

 a good deal. An individual who has fruit enough to create any attention 

 and remains still on the market, and in the hands of a good commission 

 man can build up a reputation and let the others do as they please. In 

 doing cooperative work it may be well to pay a man to hunt up markets 

 for you; you had better do this than to lose a lot of money ni^xt summer. 

 But, as 1 said before, probably the best way out of it is by individual repu- 

 tation. But whatever we do, instead of attempting to remedy evils that 

 are out of our reach, turn the searchlight on and see if we are doing 

 everything just as well as we know how. I would do everything I could 

 to remedy the evil at the other end of the route, but first let us see if we 

 are doing our work the very best we know how. 



DISCUSSION. 



Mr. Bryant: Can we all avail ourselves of this good packing? A man 

 says "if you have enough to attract any attention under the present sys- 

 tem of selling fruit," and a large quantity of fruit — a man of forty acres 

 I have found in the few years back that he does not get satisfactory pay 

 a good deal of the time for straight packing ; when the fruit is rather 

 scarce he does, but when there is an abundance of it it seems to be all 

 swallowed up in a great mass. Now,'! have been shipping for years to a 

 house that Mr. Morrill favored, and I find that when fruit is scarce the 

 quality of the fruit seems to be appreciated, but when the market is over- 

 crowded, it seems to go along with the rest; and it is quite discouraging. 

 And now, as to gaining reputation, I am shipping plums ; two years ago 

 I shipped an order for several houses, and last year I thought I would 

 have the same place to ship to. I find that two of these men had failed, 

 and the other wrote to me that they would not allow him to sell — and 

 there I lost my reputation. 



Mr. Hall: I think that Mr. Morrill bore on rather heavy in regard to 

 saying he thought over half of the fruit growers in Michigan were dishon- 

 est in their work, and I should hate to feel of the people of South Haven 

 or in the vicinity of South Haven that half of them were defrauding the 

 people. I do not think it is quite as heavy as that, although I think if 

 we would all, when marketing our fruit, go to work and put up a nice bas- 

 ket and put our name on it, it would be better. When we put up some 

 we say we do not want our name on them. I think if we put our name 

 on all packages, and if they are all right, the men that bought them last 

 year will say they will buy them this year. If every man would stamp 

 his own name on every basket, then there would be no difficulty in the 

 little ones in the center and covered up with the big ones. Every man 



