REPORT OF THE SECRETARY AND LIBRARIAN. 349 



have been built the accommodation has always fallen behind the 

 needs of the library. It is to be hoped that we shall not be com- 

 pelled to wait much longer for such accommodation as shall be 

 commensurate with the needs and value of this unrivalled horti- 

 cultural library. 



The means of promoting horticulture which has ever been most in 

 favor in this Society has been the exhibition of horticultural pro- 

 ducts. But only three weeks after the organization of the Society 

 a Committee on the Library was chosen, with the view of collect- 

 ing books, drawings, engravings, etc., relating to horticulture and 

 kindred subjects. This was before a single prize had been offered 

 for any fruit, flower, or vegetable. In about a year from the 

 incorporation of the Society more than $700 had been remitted to 

 London and Paris in paj^ment for books. When we consider that 

 the only funds of the Society at that time were derived from 

 admission fees and assessments, the devotion of so large a part of 

 its means to the library shows the importance attached to this 

 department by the founders of the Society. Besides the books 

 purchased many valuable works had been presented. 



It should be remembered that the best exhibition of horticultural 

 products ever made, however much gratification it may afford to 

 refined taste, or however much it may satisfy the love of beauty 

 or stimulate a desire to produce like results, in itself affords abso- 

 lutely no information to the inquirer on the last mentioned point. 

 If he is fortunate enough to place himself in communication with 

 the growers they are generally ready to afford information so far 

 as the hurry of an exhibition permits. Moreover the exhibitions 

 are at the oftenest but once a week and then for only a few hours, 

 while the greater shows occur but a few times in a year. The 

 meetings for discussion during the last fifteen winters have elicited 

 a vast amount of most reliable and useful information on horticul- 

 ture, yet from the necessity of the case these can be continued 

 during only a small part of the year and be attended by compara- 

 tively few persons. But the Library is always here and always 

 ready to yield its stores of information on almost every conceivable 

 subject connected with horticulture. These remarks are made 

 because that as a source of information on hoi'ticulture the library 

 has not been appreciated, and in the hope that its usefulness may 

 hereafter be more nearly commensurate with its possibilities. 

 Moreover we believe that if it were appreciated as it should be, the 

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