142 PROCEEDINGS, 



cultivation of this taste, and the improvement of this art, within the means of the Society, 

 is worthy of its serious consideration. With all due deference, however, for the enlightened 

 judgment from which it emanates, your Committee cannot feel that the carrying into 

 effect of the recommendation of the President, ior the establishment of a Professorship of 

 Landscape Gardening, would be attended with any practical benefits to the Society, or the 

 public ; but believe that any effectual encouragement of the art is, at present, beyond the 

 means of the Society, and that it must continue to be dependent, for its cultivation and 

 improvement, upon the formation of an improved taste^ and sense of its want, on the part 

 of the public. 



The production of new varieties of fruits, from seed, is an object especially worthy of the 

 attention of the Society; not only because such may be supposed to be better adapted 

 to our soil and climate, than such as are of foreign origin, but because, both from past 

 experience, as well as upon scientific principles, great improvement, especially in some 

 species, may reasonably be expected. Wilh respect to some species of fruits, it is true, so 

 great improvements have in this way already been effected, as to leave, indeed, but little 

 to be hoped for ; while the improvement and amelioration of others, by raising of seedlings, 

 have been almost entirely neglected. While, during all seasons of the year, the choicest 

 varieties of Pears and Apples, already approximate to perfection, and Hovey's seedling is 

 such an advance, both in size and flavor, beyond the common Strawberry, as to leave but 

 little to be desired, and the Diana Grape shows what can be effected by raising of seedlings 

 of that species of fruit, the improvement of the Blackberry, the Currant, and the Gooseberry, 

 seems almost to have escaped the attention of fruit cultivators in this country. Notwith- 

 standing the degree of perfection already attained, liberal premiums are offered by the 

 Society, for new pears and apples, of native origin ; and it has appeared to your Committee 

 advisable, that a similar encouragement should be extended, for the production of a 

 new variety, from seed, superior to any now in cultivafion, of those above named as 

 compnratively neglected. 



The recommendation, or suggestion, of the President, as to the expediency of holding 

 the next Annual Exhibition of the Society under a tent, instead of, as heretofore, in the Hall 

 of the Society, or some other larger room, has been with your Committee, a subject 

 of serious deliberation, and careful inquiry. It is a matter calculated to give rise to 

 considerations of an opposite character, and is one about which opposite opinions will 

 probably be entertained, as the considerations suggested may appear, one way or the other, 

 to preponderate. The expense attending the holding of the exhibition in any other place 

 than the Hall of the Society, is a matter of no small importance ; for, while a niggardly 

 parsimony in the management of the affairs of the Society is to be avoided, care should be 

 taken, that a liberal economy in expenditure does not run into a wasteful extravagance. 

 The removal of the furniture, fixtures, and dishes, — the newly fitfing up and arranging 

 them, — the hire of the tent, or hall, and the lighting of it, — must necessarily be attended 

 with much cost, without taking into view the loss arising from the breakage of, or injury to, 

 the furniture; a loss not wholly to be avoided. The increased cost to the Society, of 

 having its exhibition at any other place than its own hall, would, then, seem to be a suffi- 

 cient objection to the so doing, unless obviated by some expected corresponding increase 

 of advantage, to he derived therefrom. And this, those who favor the project confidently 

 anticipate, from a greatly increased number of visitors; increased over what it would be, 

 if the exhibition was held in the Hall of the Society, to an extent more than sufficient to 

 balance any increase of expenditure thereby ; and by a sufficient space obtained to exhibit 

 the Friiits and Flowers to advantage; space, as they say, that cannot be afforded by the 

 Hall of the Society. That the few lastAnnual Exhibitions of the Society have, from some 

 cause, been le^s jiumerously attended than is desirable, is not to be denied. Whether 

 the holding the exhibition under a tent, would, from its novelty, be more attractive to the 



