THE NOBILITY OF SERVICE. 39I 



I am too young a man to have had any remembrance of those 

 reminiscences given here tonight. I was in the state probably 

 about the time that Brother Harrison was serving as an advance 

 guard, so to speak, of the advancing army of civilization, and 

 my only regret is that he did not stay in Minnesota instead of 

 going to Nebraska and trying to sweeten up that state. If he 

 had stayed here I have no doubt the cause of horticulture would 

 have been advanced more than it has, I remember the first years 

 I was here how comparatively weak the horticultural society was 

 and how I admired the fidelity of the few men who were putting 

 their hearts into it — Wyman Elliot for one, and J. S. Harris, 

 a sweet natured, earnest, faithful fellow — and as I look back 

 over the years that have followed since my first experience, 

 and as I look around upon you tonight as representatives of 

 this work, and as I see what you are accomplishing in the pro- 

 duction of apples in this state, I am moved to say that I heartily 

 agree with the sentiment expressed in an evening paper : that 

 no body of men in Minnesota, of the same number of men, 

 is doing as much for themselves and for the State of Minnesota 

 as this body of horticulturists. And it is to me particularly de- 

 lightful the enthusiasm which as individuals you have, as well 

 as the community of interest you feel in the progress of your 

 work. When a man plows an infinite number of acres, sows an 

 infinite amount of seed and reaps an infinite harvest, and goes 

 to the bank ultimately and deposits his cash, it is entirely a 

 commercial and business operation; but when a man laboriously 

 studies the laws of life, hybridizing, developing and creating 

 new species, and there comes into existence a new life, so to 

 speak, something that never was before, why it is almost like 

 being a partner to the Almighty in creation ;' and I cannot help 

 feeling that these horticulturists as they produce one thing 

 after another that is new have for the object thus produced a 

 feeling almost akin to parental love. 



Now you are doing the State of Minnesota a wonderful 

 amount of good, and you are doing it in two or three ways. I 

 stepped into your meeting yesterday, and I heard parts of two 

 addresses, one by Mr. Rowell and the other by Mr. Harrison. 

 The one presented very strongly the commercial value of your 

 work in producing the best apples, and the other dealt with very 

 much effectiveness upon the creation of beauty. You are doing 

 great things in both respects, in making it possible for this state 

 to produce what years ago it seemed impossible for it to pro- 



