1872.] REPORT OP SECRETARY AND LIBRARIAN. 63 



It will be observed that while the number of contributors has scarcely 

 varied, bv a remarkable coincidence being precisely the same in 1870 and 

 1872, the aggregate of articles upon exhibition has nearh- doubled. Mucli 

 of this increase is doubtless due to the enlargement of our facilities for 

 di.splay. The purchase of new bottles, and of stands for their reception, 

 induced Floriculturists to cull from their profusion, being assured that 

 they would no longer be compelled to return home with their collections 

 unopened for lack of space. The engagement of Washburn Hall con- 

 vinced the growers of vegetables that the Thanksgiving Squash need not 

 again be hidden behind the bushel basket in which it was conveyed, if 

 not contained. But more than all else, to that beneficent Providence 

 which revived the parched earth with copious rains, supplying generous 

 nurture to abundant crops and tilling our horn with plenty, are we in- 

 debted for the ample illustration afforded by our Exhibition that the prim- 

 eval promise of seed time and harvest is not falsified in our own day. 



The display of Apples — that most valuable of all Fruits — deprived of 

 which, and the Shag-Bark we might well adopt the advice of a shrewd, if 

 somewhat luckless politician, and '' go West," was absolutely without 

 precedent. Of the three (•^) leading competitors, one furnished forty-four 

 (44); another fifty (o'w); and the third sixty-seven (67) varieties. Almost 

 invariably the specimens were handsome, fully developed, and free from 

 traces of injury Ijy insects. "Would not the time seem to have arrived for 

 the President of the New England Agricultural Society, in his rare inter- 

 vals of leisure from the congenial pursuits of the demagogue, to revise 

 his opinions, and, in a new edition of What I Know About Pomology, in- 

 form the Farmers of Sterling and Bolton whether he still thinks it best 

 for them to fell their orchards. 



The unusual number of entries of Fruit, of Pears not less than Apples, 

 under the head of " l!fameless," requires the application of a prompt and 

 efficient remedy. It is recommended that, hereafter, all plates of varieties, 

 not identified when entered, l)e set aside for especial examination by the 

 Committee on Nomenclature. It is wholly indefensible to allow a general 

 or a limited collection to be swollen by the addition of any variety where- 

 of, the name being doubtful, the quality must be equally uncertain. 



Grapes were neither in profuse supply, nor ripe. Even the Rogers 

 Hybrids, in the culture and dissemination of which Mr. Lovell, of West 

 Boylston, has been so successful, failed to mature their clusters. Of 

 course it was beyond the power of any Committee to form a definite judg_ 

 ment upon the newei varieties. 'J he mild weather has been protracted so 

 far into the Autumn, however, that many kinds have ripened since the 

 Annual Exhibition which, at that date, gave but little promise. As we 

 gain in experience and knowledge of the requirements of the vine, it be- 



