No. 4.] MARKET GARDENING. 31 



country. I notice one of our market gardeners with us to- 

 day, and I will call upon the Hon. Warren W. Rawson of 

 Arlington to speak to you. 



Mr. Rawson. I thoroughly agree with nearly everything 

 the speaker has said. You know it is very difficult to get up 

 a lecture of this kind, and not say something. Fifteen years 

 ago, as he mentions, we did not have the technical training 

 that we have to-day, hut we had less of it thirty or forty years 

 ago ; and we have found that the technical training which we 

 have received, or which the young men have received, from 

 the Agricultural College has been of great advantage to us 

 all. 



The farmers of Massachusetts, however, are not close 

 enough in touch with the Agricultural College or with its 

 departments. I believe we should have a course there for 

 the market gardener or the man upon the farm, to run from 

 the 1st of November to the 1st of May, because that is the 

 time of the year when work upon the farm is not so pressing, 

 and might well be spent in getting the technical part, and 

 the other six months should be devoted to practical work on 

 the farm. In this course there should be commercial instruc- 

 tion, that would teach the young man how to keep accounts, 

 because that is one of the most important points in agricul- 

 ture, — ■ not only in market gardening but in any sort of 

 farming. 



One of the problems we have to contend with to-day in 

 market gardening is that of help. It is a very difficult one 

 to settle. I don't know that it is any more difficult for a 

 market gardener than it is for the farmer ; but for a market 

 gardener it is much easier to-day than it was ten, fifteen or 

 twenty years ago, because we have found that it is absolutely 

 necessary to grow a large quantity of our crops under glass. 

 To do this it is necessary to keep help the year round; and 

 in keeping them that way we can get good help, — that is, 

 by paying them good wages. A man who is willing to work 

 is worth good wages; I don't care what department you put 

 him into, he is worth good pay, and some men are worth 

 twice as much as others. There is no regular scale for men. 



