410 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



what extended experience. These grapes have, it is true, been 

 proved by Mr. Blood, for several years, but your committee 

 have seen them but once, and responsible to the society and 

 th6 public therefor, they can make their award only upon their 

 own examination and judgment. 



In the Massachusetts Horticultural Society no new seedling 

 fruit can receive a premium until it has been tested from three 

 to five years in succession, and the reasons that led to the 

 adoption of such a rule, apply forcibly to the case now under 

 consideration. The premium offered by the society is a liberal 

 one, and its award is a matter of moment, not to the society 

 and competitor only, but the public, because such award gives 

 the assurance and pledge of the society, that the fruit, to which 

 it is made, is worthy of an extended cultivation, a warrant that 

 should not, as your committee think, be given until authorized 

 by such repeated examinations as will greatly tend to prevent 

 the commission of error. 



For these reasons, your committee, thinking that they have 

 not had sufficient opportunities of testing them, to feel certain 

 that they fully answer the conditions required by the society^ 

 while entertaining a very favorable opinion of their merits, 

 have refrained fi"om awarding premiums at this time, to Mr. 

 Blood's grapes, and recommend to the trustees the withholding 

 of such, until by further trials their claims shall be more clearly 

 established. 



Joseph S. Cabot, Chairman. 



From the Report of the Cotnmittee on Vegetables. 



To this committee were assigned those productions of the 

 vegetable kingdom, not classed among the fruits, as the apple, 

 pear, quince, peach, plum, grape, &c., or the lovely and beauti- 

 ful flowers ; these were placed under the charge of other com- 

 mittees. 



The collection was very good, exceeding that of any previ- 

 ous year. It was very promiscuous, including varieties of corn, 

 squashes, melons, tomatoes, cabbages, celery, onions, potatoes, 

 beets, &c., some of these are the ripened fruit, some the 



