138 THE CONNECTICUT POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



(Laughter.) I presume I am able to do that because I think 

 one of us Rhode Islanders is equal to any three of you Con- 

 necticut people. (Applause and laughter.) 



We are very modest in Rhode Island, as you may assume 

 from that remark, if you don't already know it, and a little 

 bashful and diffident in talking to an audience of this kind, 

 and we carry that to the extent that last week in Boston at 

 the annual meeting of the New England Fruit Show Asso- 

 ciation, Air. Perry from Vermont, claimed that they raised 

 better Rhode Island Greenings in Vermont than they did in 

 any other part of the United States, and he looked at me, and 

 I suppose he thought he was going to get a fall out of me. 

 But I told him they did, because the Vermont tree came from 

 Rhode Island. I guess he thought the original Rhode Island 

 Greening tree was in Vermont, because I have been trying a 

 year to find that tree so I could write an article on the original 

 Rhode Island Greening tree, and I found about 1,000 original 

 trees in Rhode Island, but when I came to trace them down, 

 I couldn't find any authority to show it. Now the fact was, 

 this gentleman from Vermont came over to Rhode Island 

 and got some scions from the original tree, and before I go 

 back to Rhode Island I will see where it is, and then I will 

 write an article, and perhaps I will read it to you. 



I don't know of any man or woman whom I have less 

 respect for than he or she who doesn't speak well of their 

 own organization or their own home. I think a person who 

 g'oes out and belittles their own home or their own organiza- 

 tion, be it the Grange or the Pomological Society, or whatever 

 is is, ought to be annihilated, they are not fit to live. And I 

 think the question came up yesterday if we weren't overdoing 

 it a little, spraying so much with lime-sulphur? It occurred 

 to me yesterday if they were not overdoing another thing in 

 thinking that they were the only people on the face of the 

 earth. (Laughter.) I admire very much your State Capitol, 

 I admire your society and the work it has done in the last 

 few years, and I only wish Rhode Island were one-half or 

 one-quarter as energetic as you are. 



