68 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



The difficulty I have now is that I don't get red apples enough. 

 Trim the trees out — but Northern Spies will bear and want a 

 good deal of foliage. But pale Northern Spies, good large 

 apples, ripen in the cellar and they are as good as the red ones, 

 come out a kind of an orange color, and take them along in the 

 middle of May and you can't get nothing better. The demand 

 for Northern Spies, good apples, is growing all over the country. 

 Today a lady came to me, introduced herself and wanted to know 

 if I had Northern Spies ; said she had two barrels of me two 

 years ago and she never had any such apples in her, life. Now 

 last year apples were a drug in the market. A man came along, 

 looked at my Northern Spies and wanted to know what I asked 

 for them. I told him $2.50 right through. Didn't think he 

 would take me up. They were selling Baldwins for a dollar a 

 barrel then if they could get it. But he took me up. I might 

 have got twice as much for them, but of course I stood my 

 ground and he took the apples and made lots of money on them. 

 That is all right, you know, but this year I calculate to hold 

 them where I can stand out. I have been offered $3.75 for 

 them and now they stand at $4 and they will rise on that before 

 long. 



You can raise good fruit if you will deserve good fruit in the 

 State of Maine. Here we are, close to tide water — don't cost 

 but little to carry a barrel of good apples to Liverpool. We are 

 cl©se to the shore. Freight is cheap. We have the soil and the 

 climate that brings the apple to perfection. Suppose you plant 

 a crop of corn and never go nigh it, only pick ofif the ears — how 

 many ears do you get? It is so with the orchard, people only 

 think about it at picking time and then what they pick they 

 think is so much clear gain. But the result is that the quality 

 of our apples is going down in the market. Now why not build 

 that quality up? Why not try to cultivate our orchards and 

 see the result ? Then you will have no trouble about packers, — 

 not at all. But I should like to see the man that would take a 

 lot of wormy, bruised apples and pack them so they are in good 

 shape and will go well. But you take good, smooth apples, 

 uniform in size, no wqrms, and a little child can put those apples 

 into the barrel and they are all right. The trouble is, you don't 

 raise the fruit good enough. 



If we would go to work in the State of Maine and plant our 

 orchards and trim up the old trees and cultivate them, the boys 



