STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 45 



meeting with the issue and attempting to control, if not extermi- 

 nate, the insects that are invading the State. 



The question as to what the Society can do — I didn't exactly 

 know how to put it when I formulated it, and I thought it better 

 be put in that way because it might give an opportunity of 

 saying whatever the occasion might seem to call for. I don't 

 know how the Society as an organization just now can do any 

 more than what it has done. But at the same time I do feel that 

 the Society ought to keep the fire burning and keep the interest 

 up all the time, so that when future action may be called for we 

 shall be ready to meet it. 



The committee, in formulating and discussing the law, thought 

 a good deal about the appointment of some special officers, a 

 commission or something of that kind, and we decided that we 

 had departments enough now in the State of Maine and that it 

 v^-as not best for us to formulate or to organize any more. So 

 we placed it in the hands of the Department of Agriculture. 

 And now it appears to me, and I think it appears to every one 

 in the State who has intelligently investigated it, that the depart- 

 ment has faithfully done its duty, and that here at our meeting 

 we should give some expression of approval of what the depart- 

 ment has done. 



A great deal of literature has been published in the news- 

 papers, a great many bulletins, etc., have been sent out by the 

 Department of Agriculture and over to the Experiment Station 

 where, I should say, they have been equally active along this 

 same line in their departments bearing upon the habits and the 

 life history of the brown-tail moth. I sometimes feel that all 

 that work has gone for naught because the thing comes to me in 

 certain ways. To illustrate what I mean. During the month of 

 August some one over to Mercer sent word to me something 

 like this : " We have got them in Mercer and I wish you would 

 tell Mr. Knowlton so." Well, he didn't bring any samples with 

 liim, and I said, *' What is it you have got over there? I would 

 like to know. Something alarming the way you spoke."" 

 ^' Well," he said, " Mr. So-and-so says that we have got the real 

 thing, the real brown-tail moth." Well, I told him that was 

 certainly a very alarming situation, I didn't realize that they 

 were so far into the interior of the State as in the town of 

 Mercer. I thought — I certainly hoped there must be some mis- 

 take. But he said that they had surely got them. Then I 



