152 THE CONNECTICUT POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



It was nearly ten o'clock when the diners reached the 

 last course and President Rogers arose and rapped for si- 

 lence. Introducing- Mr. Gold, as the toastmaster of the even- 

 ing, the President said : 



"Ladies and Gentlemen : God put the tree in the Gar- 

 den of Eden, where the first garden was planted. There, we 

 are told, the apple was raised. Next we read about the prod- 

 igal son going away. The prodigal returned, and when he 

 returned he found plenty at his father's house. Now we 

 have had a plentiful dinner, and we are about to have plenty 

 of another kind of a feast. Without further delay I am go- 

 ing to call on our Toastmaster, Mr. Gold, to take charge at 

 this point. 



Toastmaster Gold: Mr. President, Ladies and Gen- 

 tlemen : Do not think this is any choice of mine that I stand 

 here in this capacity. Owing to the urgency of the railroad 

 trains, whatever remarks I might have for you' I will defer 

 until a later time, and immediately call upon His Excellency, 

 the Governor, Simeon E. Baldwin, who will now address us. 

 (Applause). 



Governor Baldwin : Mr. Toastmaster and Ladies and 

 Gentlemen : I was at West Point one day last week, and in 

 talking with one of the officers I found that he had recently 

 returned from the Philippines. He stated that he had been 

 there twice in a year's time, and that the only thing an Amer- 

 ican needed to be particular about when he went there was 

 to eat no fruit. He said that if they did that they were safe. 

 I have never, myself, taken very much to the idea of nursing 

 the Philippines along year after year at the cost of the na- 

 tion, and if you cannot eat fruit there, I have still less use 

 for them. 



Fruit, I think, is one of the good thincis of life, and I am 

 glad that the use and consumption of fruit in New England, 

 and in the country at large, has become so general. When 

 I was a boy the common yellow banana was not so very com- 

 mon. I can remember when bananas were indeed a good 

 deal of a rarity, and in my father's day oranges were also. In 



