STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 89 



same rate as the other, but costing much less, and thereby increasing 

 the profit of the retailer. 



To a considerable extent Maine has enjoyed the reputation of 

 producing some of the best fruit known to the trade ; and if dealers 

 and consumers could feel assured of obtaining what they bargain for, 

 they would not higgle about the price paid. It is a lamentable fact 

 that some packers, yea, many, and that term will doubtless include 

 some who grow the fruit, will nearly fill the barrel with an inferior 

 quality, taking care to place at the top some of the finest quality, 

 then put on the head, marked in big letters, ''•A No. i," and in due 

 time send it to the market. How fa-^ removed is this practice from 

 that attempted by the flour agent quoted above? 



The question of supply and demand will regulate itself, but the 

 principle of honest practice in the handling and marketing of fruit 

 lies within the province of man to regulate and control, and the best 

 methods to adopt on a matter worthy of the most candid and serious 

 consideration. 



It is claimed, and indeed it may be true, that this is an excep- 

 tional year ii: the matter of the disposal of our fruit. Even the most 

 careful and honorable producers and dealers find the market in an 

 unusually depressed condition, and yet at present prices no branch 

 of farm husbandrj', excepting possibly that of dairying, brings bet- 

 ter returns. In my own individual case and it was no exception in 

 the locality where I reside, one dollar per barrel was received as 

 they were taken from the orchard, which included all grades, and 

 no barrels furnished, the only expense being the picking, and in our 

 case the drawing for the distance of tw") miles. 



One of my neighbors has in cold storage his entire crop of '91, 

 excepting the Harveys. He informs me that his fruit never grew in 

 greater beauty and perfection than it did last season, and its present 

 c ndition is very fine. "With an outlook for high prices less encour- 

 aijing than in former years, yet his anticipations for a satisfactory 

 deal as the season advances are of such a nature as to cast rays of 

 composure upon his countenance. And this, doubtLss, is only one 

 case in the many that exist in the different sections of our State. 



But there are many small farmers, orchardists, scattered through- 

 out the fruit growing belt of our domain who seem well nigh dis- 

 couraged at the present aspect of affairs, and reason, not unwisely 

 perhaps, that a repetition of this dull period in the market is liable 

 to again occur, and having relied_so fully upon the result of this, to 



