148 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



a stock company. A small percentage 

 of the gross amount of the sales would pay 

 the manager and the rent of a storage house 

 for making up car lots. A large central 

 cold storage warehouse would be an im- 

 portant adjunct and would of course re- 

 quire capital, and those not taking stock in 

 it would of course have to pay for the use 

 of it should they store in it. We presume 

 that several district unions would cover the 

 fruit sections of the province, and the inana- 

 gers of these could agree together on the 

 fixed prices, and thus the output of the 

 whole province would be under control. 



What About the Surplus Stock ? 



Why, unless it can be sold to canning and 

 evaporating companies it had better waste 

 in the orchard than simply be unloaded on 

 the market and bring down the prices. But, 

 if properly distributed there is room in our 

 own country for all the No. i grade of fruit 

 v/e can grow, and we should spray, prune, 

 thin and cultivate is to avoid wasting the 

 vigor of our trees in producing No. 2 fruit. 



Fruit Growers the Last to Unite 



IT does seem that every other class of men 

 are more ready to unite than fruit 

 growers. Several reasons were suggested, 

 one that they were too selfish to risk an- 

 other's good for fear it might not prove to 

 their advantage ; another that they would 

 not trust each other, but would believe every 

 word of the sleek-tongued commission mer- 

 chant, who offered them his stamp and pro- 

 mised a good market. Nevertheless it was 

 agreed that the time had come for a union, 

 otherwise the business would be ruined by 

 foolish competition. The manager of a 

 union would be able to avoid all competition 

 by a careful system of distribution, and the 

 expense of the whole business would be a 

 much less percentage than that now paid the 

 commission merchants, while the net returns 

 would in many cases be doubled. Plainlv 

 this is the most serious and important ques- 



tion before us ; let us face it and solve it a= 

 quickly as possible. 



M 



Early Plums 



R. R. S. EATON, of Kentville, N. 

 S., writes : 



Please give me your opinion on the time of rij;)en- 

 ing and the quality of the new plum, the Emerald, 

 as compared with Abundance and Red June. 



Though not as showy a plum as the 

 Japans, and not quite as large, yet the Em- 

 erald is, in our opinion, a better dessert 

 plum ; while in point of season it is about ten 

 days in advance of either the Abundance or 

 the Red June. We have not yet fully 

 tested it at our stations, so that we are un- 

 able to give any very definite reply to our 

 enquirer, 



Mr. Murray Pcttit, Winona, Our 

 Director for Wcntworth, Water- 

 loo, Halton, Etc. 



AT a meeting of our Association, held 

 at Wingham in 1885, Mr. Murray 

 Pettit, of Winona, was elected a director of 

 our Association, and has held the position 

 ever since. He was born in 1843 o^i the 

 old Pettit homestead, near Winona, where 

 in the latter part of the i8th century his 

 grandfather, Mr. John Pettit, a U. E. Loyal- 

 ist, had received from the crown a grant of 

 468 acres of land. 



Grape Growing 



Some thirty years ago Mr. Pettit first 

 turned his attention to the cultivation of the 

 grape, a fruit which in his experience has 

 proved to be a more constant source of 

 revenue than the peach. He was one of 

 the first to plant a vineyard of Niagara 

 grapes, under the original terms of the com- 

 pany, in that each buyer should give in one- 

 half of the proceeds until the company liad 

 received $1.50 per vine. This investment 

 proved a profitable one for Mr. Pettit, the 

 three hundred vines planted in the spring of 



