104 MASSACHUSETTS HOBTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



The increasing clifficnlly of riAvarding prizes, especially at the 

 annual cxhiltiti( lis, cau.-ed by conipelition yearly ^rowini closer, 

 and the inquiries of exhibitois as to the princi[>les and methods 

 adopted in making the awards, induce us, even at the risk of 

 making this report unduly long, to offer a few remarks on the 

 subject, as an act of justice to exhibitors. "We would be undei- 

 stood as speaking particular!}' of the prizes for collections of pears 

 at the annual exhibition, which are those most closel}' contested. 

 A general review of all the collections is first laken, which at least 

 serves to show that certain colli ctions have no chance of takin": 

 even the lowest of the four prizes, but not to award the prizes to 

 the others with certainty. They arc therefore marked on the fol- 

 lowing points: First, size; second, beauty; third, quality; and 

 fourth, desirableness for general cultivation ; each of which, when 

 perfect, is marked 1, so that a perfect collection of twenty varieties 

 would be marked 80 ; any deficiency is noted by a fraction — i, ^, 

 etc. It has been found inconvenient to use fractions less than 

 fourths, but if a dish is marked ^ for beauty, when it perhaps de- 

 serves a shade higher, very likely 1 will be the nearest mark for 

 size, though a trifie too high, and thus one offsets the other. Or if 

 a dish, when summed up at 3f , for instance, is thought to be a 

 trifle too high, perhaps the next one, which may sum up oJ-, will be 

 as much too low, and so the errors will balance each other again. 

 It may be said that some method of marking should be adopted 

 ■which would enable us to mark exactly, and it has occurred to us 

 that by making the perfect mai'k for each point 10 instead of 1, 

 we might mark with gi eater nicet}', but we doubt whether even 

 then we could always disci iininate with perfect exactness; and 

 indeed we do not put forth this method as by any means perfect, 

 or even as the best that can be devised, but partl}^ with the hope 

 that improvements ma}' be suggested. It may be of inteiest to 

 state that the collection to which was awarded the first prize this 

 year was marked up to 76]-, which we believe is the highest we 

 have ever marked. In a few instances an extra fine dish will be 

 marked above 1 on some point ; and this was the case w ith a dish 

 of liartletts in the above-mentioned collection, which were so large 

 as to be counted 1^ in bizc, and the dish, Ijcing perAct in all 

 other points, was marked 4^ in all. The other prize collections 

 varied from 71^ to 72^, there being both this year and last a tie 

 between two collections. To save time, the marking is made by a 



