38 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



You develop your own business; on the other hand, we must 

 depend on you. We are glad to welcome the young boys to 

 our school, as you are glad to welcome us here; and we hope 

 to welcome the girls also, as soon as provision can be made for 

 them. Send to me the name of every bright boy who is inter- 

 ested in farming. We desire to do them good. 



We desire heartily to accept the welcome so cordially ex- 

 tended. 



Music: Quartette. 



Toast: ."Horticulture in Minnesota." Response by O. C. 

 Gregg of Minneapolis, president of the Farmers' Institute: 



Ladies and i/entlemen: — Not because it is customary, but because 1 feel it, 

 I wish to say that I have a very pleasing sensation come over me as I meet 

 you here in Lake City to-day. I v^ant to make a personal statement of 

 fact. The time was when I regarded a horticulturist in Minnesota, as a 

 misguided man, but I always had a respect for you as a body. I thought 

 Minnesota was a land of blizzards and not of fruit, but I have been con- 

 verted, 



I was brought up a Methodist, and I look upon you as brethen and sis- 

 ters in the great horticultural church. I have come to this belief by 

 reason of experience. I was slow to believe, being, probably, naturally 

 conservative, but I have seen so much of the successful work of the hor- 

 ticulturists of Minnesota, that I a:ii forced to believe that it has in it all 

 the elements of success. Perhaps you will say that all I mean is that we 

 can raise choke cherries, etc., but I am satisfied that we are going to make 

 a grand success of that New England product, the apple. We propose to 

 stand by apples on the southwestern frontier, where my farm is, not with 

 the hope only, but with the expectation, that we will succeed. I expect 

 to-day, from branches in southwestern Minnesota, fruit that I shall pluck 

 with my own hand. 



Very naturally I regard this from the standpoint of one who goes about 

 a good deal over the state. When I go through the streets of Minneapo- 

 lis and see the little newsboys, I wish they had the privileges I had when 

 I was a boy and could go out into the orchards and pluck all the fruit I 

 wanted, club the trees etc. But there are many boys on farms even who 

 are hungry for fruit. Very soon, however, we shall have a lot of boys and 

 girls growing up who shall no longer hunger for fruit. 



I look upon you this afternoon, and I say you are every one of you 

 ministers, and may the Father of all bless you in the noble work in which 

 you are engaged. The work has a brighter look than ever before. Some 

 one asked me, "Do you think every one is going to raise fruit?" I said 

 no, but scatter all the seed you can and some of it may fall into recep- 

 tive soil. You who are old members of this horticultural society can take 

 this consolation; you can say, "I earnestly work for a cause, that has 

 made the state better." You can say that success is with you. 



