28 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1888. 



and beyond all, — larceny and trespass, on Sunday, are infected 

 with a delicious taint that carries with it a peculiar charm of its 

 own. So they swarm ; for in their mere number is immunity. 

 And if hordes are but strong enough, theft ceases to be a crime, 

 being transmuted into, as it were, a simple maluin prohibitum. 



There is but one unpardonable sin ! under the modern electric 

 light, — and that is Thirst. Therefore must lice be suftered in the 

 Hop-yard, and Barley withhold its golden grain, that Beer may 

 no longer be brewed and bottled for the minister and his predes- 

 tined saints. To that end should the apple be surrendered to the 

 cankerworm and codling-moth that, the fruit being spoiled, there 

 may be no more cider ; and lionest vinegar cease to be used upon 

 beans. Pears shall be allowed to blight, at hazard ; that perry 

 may never again be tolerated, save perchance by the Committee 

 at an Agricultural hippodrome. " Property is Theft ! " shrieked 

 the Frenchman ; and he has never lacked disciples to reduce his 

 dogma to practice. "Property is Crime!" yell the Pharasees, 

 when the Grape is plucked from the vine and its juice sealed up 

 in a bottle. What wonder that, with such laxity of thought and 

 absurdity of logic, men of only common intelligence should be 

 thrown oft' their balance ; should confound the distinction be- 

 tween right and wrong; and should conclude that there is more 

 truth than poetry in the old distich whose burden was ever 



" That they should get who have the power ; 

 And they should keep, who can." 



Nothing novel, of manifest excellence, was shown in our Halls 

 during the season just past. Old and approved varieties, whether 

 in the domain of Ceres, Flora, or Pomona, maintained their es- 

 tablished rank despite the unpropitious season. Yet their names 

 were as familiar as household words and their ])reeminence 

 universally conceded. Time, however, may be said to have set 

 the seal of approval to the Ansault and Carle's Bergamot, 

 among Pears; and those varieties of recent introduction, should 

 now take first rank. It is plain that the Ansault matures later 

 than has been supposed: specimens gathered on the 9th October 

 being one-third larger than those wliich gained the award on the 

 6th September previous. Juicy as the Belle Lucrative, it has 



