52 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOaBTY. [1878. 



Washington on the brain. He never fails to have an ample yield of it 

 upon his trees. Yet of many species there has been hard'.y a speci- 

 men ; a default that was painfully apparent at the New England Fair, 

 even if it'was held too early. Whether we exact too much from our 

 Pear trees, a deficient yield in one year off-setting the excess in that 

 which preceded ; or fail to replace with the right nutriment that pri- 

 mordial fertility which constant cultivation must needs exhaust; 

 or exceed their limit of old age, to which trees are as subject as all 

 other forms of animal or vegetable matter : in any event, and however 

 viewed, we are furnished with food enough for reflection. It answers 

 nothing to tell us of the exceeding long life of the Stuyvesant Pear-tree, 

 or of those patriarchs which perhaps even now survive, in the Kaskas- 

 kia Bottom — a memorial of the French settlers. How much better 

 were they than choke-pears, of no value to enjoy or perpetuate ! What 

 we have to determine for the future prospects of our Fruit Orchards is, 

 whether with the extreme and forced developement of quality, as in all 

 other high civilization, sin and death do not inevitably enter. Ordina- 

 rily, we exact or suffer enormous crops, year after year, for a life-time, 

 possibly compensating this vital drain with a little stable manure, and 

 then wonder that the same trees do not yield in continued and unim- 

 paired abundance. We sometimes allow our fields to lie fallow : " root 

 hog, or die!" coarsely paraphrases the injunction that we place upon 

 our orchards. Upon the trees that did bear, in A. D. 1878, there were 

 produced some noteworthy specimens. A Committee of this Society, 

 eighteen years ago, constituted of sxich experts in Pyriculture as 

 George Jaques, John Milton Earle, D. Waldo Lincoln, John C. Eipley 

 and Jonathan Grout were moved to comment upon a *' very remark- 

 '' able increase in weight — an average of two ounces apiece in twenty- 

 "four specimens of as manj'^ varieties — chiefly to be attributed, no 

 " doubt, to a very favorable season ; still much also must be claimed 

 "for a gradual improvement in the modes of cultivation, oi which we 

 " every year have new evidence.^' 



That Committee noticed a specimen Duchesse that weighed thirteen 

 and one-half ounces. What would they have said could they have 

 seen the one grown this year, by our efficient Treasurer, which turn-ed 

 the scales at twenty-two and one-half (22^) ounces ? or his ten that 

 balanced twelve and one-half (12|) pounds! The same gentleman 

 (Mr. Newton) has also exhibited twelve pears of the variety Winter 

 iVeZis that weighed five pounds, nine and three-fourths ounces; thus 



