60 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, [1875. 



collections, rather than special articles embraced therein." " For in- 

 stance, in place of offering a large purse for the largest and best collec- 

 tion of greenhouse plants, let the amount designated be distributed among 

 the plants that usually go to make up the collections." And, as of 

 greenhouse plants so, by parity of reason, is the argument applicable to 

 all the genera of fruits and vegetables. 



The members of this Society can afford to regard such suggestions from 

 high authority with a reasonable degree of complacency. There is no one 

 step therein advised, that was not long since taken, at the urgency of your 

 Secretary, or upon the prompting of your own clear perception of its im- 

 perative necessity. For years have the number of classes been steadily 

 reduced. In 1874 there were but two classifications of Pears, the genus 

 to which our Pomologists have heretofore devoted most and perhaps un- 

 due attention. In his Annual Report of that year, reviewing the salient 

 defects of the Autumnal Exhibition, your Secretary employed the follow- 

 ing language : " At that Exhibition, room was assigned to three hun- 

 '•dred and seventy-six (376) plates, containing three thousand nine hun- 

 " dred and forty (3940) Apples and Pears, which were inferior to others of 

 " their kind upon the tables, and whose simple exclusion would not only 

 " have involved a proper saving of expense, but also a downright economy 

 " of labor. Room must be gained in some way. In what manner more 

 "effectually, or to greater satisfaction, than by the abolition of every 

 " remnant of an obnoxious system, which has no other recommendation 

 " but that of antiquity ! It was well enough a generation since to avail 

 " ourselves of the experience of the Massachusetts Society. But we are 

 '•now taught by a lifetime of personal observation, and have no excuse 

 " for disregard of its admonitions. 



" The evil is as apparent in the Vegetable department, which justly 

 " demands so much of your attention, and which, within a few years, has 

 " been raised to a position of signal eminence. Competent judges ex- 

 " pressed the opinion that a better display of Vegetables was never seen 

 " in Massachusetts than that which struggled for exhibition last October in 

 " the Hall of Ceres. And yet there too were great collections — mere 

 " numerical aggregates of species, of every one of which superior speci- 

 " mens were shown by the same contributors in their single lots. No man 

 " who proposes to contest the palm of excellence for Corn, Squashes or 

 *' Potatoes will risk his chances by merging his best samples in a general 

 ''collection, any more than he would imperil his whole hopes by first ex- 

 "hibitiug his productions, blighting their freshniiss, at the poor old Hippo- 

 " drome. All " general collections " in the Vegetable Department are as 



