MEDICINE FOR TREE SHARKS. 353 



Jars to the purposes of these tree sharks and by so doing assist them 

 in fleecing their own people, as has been the case in two or three 

 instances, then we say those editors should be introduced to their 

 subscribers with their masks removed, so they would know whom 

 to credit for being swindled. Such a community could be reached 

 through the mails to some extent and perhaps enough so as to make 

 it unprofitable business for the road agents. 



We do not wish to lay a straw in the way of the honorable salesmen, 

 for much is due to his unceasing energj' and many a home has been 

 made more homelike by his untiring zeal. He makes no wild state- 

 ments he cannot substantiate and promises nothing he cannot 

 fulfill; he looks after the best interests of his customers as well as 

 those of his employer, for they are identical with his own; his stock 

 in trade is a conscience instead of a glib tongue. In view of the fact 

 that the people of the state contribute perhaps fifty times as much 

 money to tree sharks as they do to this society, I think it is time to 

 insist on a more equal division of the spoils, or we may find it neces- 

 sary to join the other association. 



The arrangement is for this society to prescribe the medicine, and 

 our secretary agrees to give it, and as this remedy will cost us only 

 a vote, we hope the society will take some action, 



Mr. Hirschinger (Wisconsin) : The state of Minnesota some 

 years ago passed a law, with which you are all undoubtedly 

 familiar, and we in Wisconsin are very familiar with your law, and 

 if any of us in Wisconsin — it did not make any difference how 

 honest we were or how conscientious we were, we could not 

 come up here to Minnesota and sell fruit trees without keeping 

 our eyes open on account of this law. But about that time the 

 nurserymen of Minnesota shut out Wisconsin very nicely and 

 turned your frauds over into Wisconsin, and if we have any 

 sharks in Wisconsin they were educated in this state, and you 

 have got them back here; and at this time — I am now an 

 editor — there is a firm printing a lot of order books for your 

 nurserj/men here. I was at that time a member of the legisla- 

 ture, and I made up my mind that Minnesota should get her 

 foot into it as deep as we did, so I went to look up that law 

 and took it to a prominent lawyer, and he said to me, "You 

 don't want to do anything of the kind; it is not constitutional 

 anyway, and if you go to work and publish in your paper that 

 an agent for a nurseryman down in Faribault is doing crooked 

 work you will get a knockout every time. Be sure you are right 

 before you put your foot in it." 



Mr. C. L. Smith: This publishing the name of the agent 

 and the statement that he is doing crooked work is not always 

 practicable, even when you know it to be a fact, and while it is 

 unfortunate that so much money is being spent every year for 



