66 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1898. 



I feel at some disadvantage in speaking upon these points, 

 since we all realize that theory and practice should go hand in 

 hand, and facing so many of you and being obliged to confess 

 that throughout the history of the Society, although I have 

 attended the exhibits, I have not produced a single thing to 

 exhibit. I plead guilty on that score, and would say that the 

 position of a teacher working for a salary is not that of a citizen 

 in a home of his own. It has been my bad luck to move from 

 place to place a good deal, and it has not been my good fortune, 

 as is the case with most of our good Methodist preachers to drop 

 into a parsonage which has already received some attention hor- 

 ticulturally. It has been my lot, rather, to find a place where 

 the wilderness has not been very much disturbed, and I can 

 really say, to clear myself on this point, that in the last ten 

 years it has been something like five different places that I have 

 inhabited, and whereas they were generally found in a state of 

 gravel banks or patches of brush and sod, I have left vines and 

 trees in all but one of them. You see, however, the disadvantage 

 that a man taking a place of that sort has in competing with any 

 of the older gardeners who have their soil in cultivation and 

 everything in fine bearing shape. But as possibly some of you 

 know, I have not kept my hands absolutely clean from mother 

 earth, and there is nothing I enjoy really better than going out 

 and digging in the garden, so that I can say from the bottom of 

 my heart that what we want as a Horticultural Society is to pro- 

 mote the knowledge of horticulture in the city, and cultivate the 

 will and the purpose, the ability and the practice, of successful 

 horticulture. 



We are now ready to take stock for a moment of our city's 

 horticultural interests, and note how these may be increased, and 

 promoted possibly, by the co-operation of the Society with the 

 public schools. 



It is probably the greatest horticultural interest, the solidest 

 and most valuable, that each house lot be provided with the best 

 flowers and the best fruits for the health, comfort and happiness 

 of the family and the community. Manj'^ parts of Worcester are 

 extremely fortunate in the education which this Society has 



