1890.] TRANSACTIONS. 7 



There has been less fruit to steal, although as many flowers, 

 since the General Court uprose with the freshets of June. Yet 

 it was an average year for thieves. Indeed, the very scarcity of 

 apples may be assumed to have put a keener edge upon that 

 especial foe of industry which, unlike the razor, needs no protec- 

 tion ! Appetite points the way ; and your Secretary may be al- 

 lowed to ask why its satiation might not approve itself a most 

 effectual cure for all but hardened sinners ? Why not administer 

 homcBopathic remedies ? Why not permit the youthful off'ender 

 to shorten his stay in the reformatory by conforming to a specific 

 diet? Feed to him, for breakfast, twenty-four transcendant 

 Crabs ; let him gorge, at noon, upon a half-dozen mealy Bous- 

 sock ; supper bringing the culmination of his punishment, in that 

 he will be required to devour, with what relish may be, a half- 

 dozen Gloria Mundi or Duchesse. To please sentimentalists, 

 this regimen might be varied ; Clairgeau being substituted when 

 Duchesse grew tiresome, and Red Bietigheimer taking the place 

 of Gloria Mundi if S. F. P. C. T. animate creation felt its bow- 

 els yearn over the suflferings of Juventus. This suggestion may 

 not be appreciated, at its true worth, by the Committee on Agri- 

 culture. Was one ever ? But it has at least the merit of costing 

 nothing in the proposal ; and not much more in the application. 



The Finance Committee were authorized at the Annual Meeting 

 of the Society, A. D. 1889, 



To procure plans and estimates for such alterations of the 

 upper stories of Horticultural Hall as shall provide for a banquet 

 or supper room adequate to entertain a large company, without 

 impairing the beauty, symmetry, or light, of the Hall of Po- 

 mona : 



Reporting the same, in their discretion, to a special meeting of 

 the Society. 



Little has been accomplished under that authorization, the 

 sketches that were drawn l)y architects being prepared, appar- 

 ently, in a partial misconception of the intent of the Committee 

 within the scope of their powers. There was no need for hurry 

 in the premises, since any considerable alteration of our Hall is to 

 be esteemed a serious matter ; to be undertaken, if needed, and 



