30 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



RESPONSE— IN BEHALF OF THE SOCIETY. 

 Secretary Elijah Cook, Vassalboro. 



Ladies and Gentlemen: It gives me great pleasure to have an 

 opportunity of thanking the honorable gentleman who has so 

 ably, so warmly, and so earnestly bid us welcome to Newport. 

 And to thank the good people of Newport who have worked so 

 earnestly to make this meeting a success. I have been pleased 

 ever since I stepped off the train and met the large-hearted, 

 broad-minded Brother Libbey, and have learned so well the 

 earnest work which he has done, together with the good people 

 of Newport, to provide for all our wants ; to help in every way 

 possible to get all the advantage, all the good, that can be 

 obtained from our meeting. We see evidence upon every hand 

 that all the people of Newport are anxious to make our coming 

 here a success, and we are pleased, grateful, and thank these 

 people most earnestly for what they have done. 



Every toiler of the soil needs encouragement, needs informa- 

 tion, needs inspiration, to help him to make his calling a success, 

 and we hope, in coming here among you, to help you to some 

 extent to enlarge the profits of the farm, to encourage you to 

 improve the methods and enlarge the possibilities of agriculture 

 in this favored section of the State. And when I say favored 

 section of the State, I mean favored of any part of the world. 

 In the great depression through which agriculture has passed, 

 there was no spot on all the earth that suffered less from that 

 depression than this northeast corner of our land. There is no 

 part of all the world that has suffered less or that has more 

 courage to take hold anew and make success in the future. I 

 was pleased with the words to which we have listened. The 

 law of compensation is true, and we have gained much during 

 the depression through which we have passed. We have gained 

 more than we could estimate, if we tried, in the one thought of 

 teaching better, higher methods in the future. The old methods 

 will not do ; they have passed away. They served their purpose, 

 but in agriculture, as in everything else, we must use business 

 principles ; we must use intellect ; we must use thought and 

 investigation all the time. And we hope that our coming here 



