66 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 
WYMAN ELLIOT, MINNEAPOLIS. 
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: : 
What a vastness there is in ourtheme. Whatan amount of centraliza- 
tion of mental and manual effort is being put into every department of 
horticulture! Did your ever think how many hours of effort of mind and 
toil of body have been devoted to developing one of our commonest fruits 
from its native habitat into the improved variety of the present day? 
The present perfection of the useful trees, fruits and flowers of our orch- 
ards, gardens and conservatories has not been brought about without spe- 
cial attention to the development of all the essential featuresand marked 
peculiarities of their structures. 
Take, for instance, the king of fruits, the apple. How many billions of 
thoughts and hours of labor have been devoted to the perfecting of this 
one fruit for hundreds of years in the past, and still we are only in the 
infancy of its development, in point of hardiness. Its distribution is 
being extended each decade and a wider breadth given to its usefulness as 
a food product. 
The wonderful adaptability of this fruit tree to climatic changes itis 
not been brought about without a vastamount of labor, toil and drudgery 
by the diligent, industrious workers in pomology. This transformation 
has been a gradual growth through a series of progressive changes, point 
by point; difficulty after difficulty has been overcome; and at the present 
time we have great hopes of extending its limit of growth and fruitage to 
much higher latitudes on our continent, that are now considered uncon- 
genial to its successful cultivation. 
These improvements in hardiness and productiveness of trce, and qual- 
ity of fruit, have been largely wrought by specialists who have given their 
time, talent and money, without stint or reward, with the true spirit of 
devotion to a noble cause. 
Extend the range of perspective vision still further, and gather in all 
the different fruits, large and small, in all their varied forms, and then 
you may have some conception of what it means to have a society whose 
purpose is to give fostering care to all the various industries that cluster 
around the prospective growth of horticulture in our state. 
It is said, ‘‘Necessity knows no law;” where there is a will, there is a~ 
way to overcome the tantalizing disappointments that have marked our 
efforts in the past. Many times we have had the problem of fruit-tree 
raising, as we thought, almost solved, but like a Phrygian king in fabu- 
lous history, who was condemned to stand up to his chin in water, with 
a tree of fair fruit over his head, both of which, as he attempted to allay 
his hunger or thirst, fled from his approach, thus always the unexpected 
has happened to blight our hopes. 
In no other calling is there greater need of combining science with 
practice, than in horticulture, and to-day those who are counted among 
our most successful cultivators are those who have conducted their ex- 
periments the most carefully along the lines indicated by the true prin- 
ciples of science. 
It is a good rule for all young, and for that matter, old people to adept, 
‘Never be afraid or ashamed to ask questions, and be ever on the alert te 
