CTION 



T no former period was such a wide- 

 spread desire manifested as exists now 

 for improving the condition of the 

 industrial population, and for developing the 

 resources of the soil in the production of an 

 adequate supply of home-grown fruit. 



The necessity for the accomplishment of these 

 objects is apparent ; for on the one hand we have 

 men in abundance who, with the aid of sound 

 guidance, could engage usefully in the work, and 

 on the other the extraordinary fact of not cities 

 and towns only, but even country villages, with 

 fruit-growing land all around them, largely sup- 

 plied with Apples grown on the western shores of 

 the Atlantic. It is true we have orchards, but of 

 what kind? In the majority of instances they are 

 composed of trees planted generations, not to say 

 centuries, ago, which can only bear fruit so small, 

 juiceless, and uninviting, that consumers naturally 

 purchase the larger and better-looking imported 



B 



