STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. lOI 



United States barrels, Nova Scotia barrels, and discounted in one 

 case 48 cents, for no other reason that I know of except that the 

 barrel didn't suit them. They are very sharp over there. If 

 you put a head into your barrel that is a little thicker than the 

 ordinary barrel head, they will discount for that too. They don't 

 want to buy wood, they are buying apples. If you put a plugged 

 head in, they will notice it. The best package for the export 

 market is the ordinary flour barrel. For domestic markets the 

 new barrel does about as well, and in some markets better 

 because they know they are clean, and they haven't got nito ruts 

 so hard and so deep as they are in Europe. 



Now in getting this secondhand flour barrel ready for market 

 you want to wash it. You can't wash it with snow or grass or a 

 dry broom. Water is the only thing that will clean it. Dash 

 into your secondhand barrel half a pail of water, take a broom, 

 get that water whirling until it comes to the top of the barrel and 

 your work is done and can be done in a few minutes; but try to 

 clean it dry, and scrub and scrub and scrub fifteen minutes and 

 then it won't be ready, and there will be flour set in motion that 

 will rattle out onto the apples and the apples will be moist and 

 it will look worse than anything you can think of on the apples. 

 The new barrel doesn't need that. All barrels need to have 

 their hoops tightened before you begin to pack. In getting new 

 barrels, the narrower the stave the better. I saw some yester- 

 day, and they were planed and white and pretty looking except 

 that the staves of some of them were nearly a foot wide, and the 

 barrel was not round on that account. As to the barrel question 

 it is going to be easier in a year or two. They are making more 

 and more new barrels so that I wouldn't wonder by next fall if 

 there were more barrels than there were apples, and barrels 

 would be quite cheap. If any of you who raise large quantities 

 of apples don't know how to get barrels — I presume you all do, 

 but for any one who doesn't — he can go ofif into Palermo or 

 Montville, some of those towns where they have been making 

 lime casks, and there will be mills there that he can get his 

 staves and stufif sawed out cheaply and transported by rail to 

 where he lives. He can get one of those coopers over there who 

 is used to it to set up the barrels at home. Those barrel makers 

 over there don't own anything, they have no machinery, they 



