PROGRESS OF FRUIT CULTURE. 105 



varieties of the strawberry, raspberry, and the blackberry, 

 we were confined to the wild species of the hedge-row and 

 the field. It is but about forty years since Mr. Hovey, of 

 Cambridge, raised the first American variety of the strawberry 

 from seed. Now, numerous local varieties, adapted to all 

 sections, make their appearance every year, and so universal 

 has this fruit become as an article for general use, and so great 

 the improvement in packing and the facilities for interchange 

 of products, that our Northern markets are supplied, instead 

 of a few weeks, as formerly, with this delicious fruit, from 

 May to August. So extensive has its cultivation become, 

 that from single railroad stations in several of our States 

 have been dispatched a thousand or more bushels per day for 

 market. In districts where no attention had been given to the 

 cultivation of this fruit twenty years ago, millions of baskets 

 are sold in addition to what is consumed at home. 



Nor can we omit the peach, of which such astonishing 

 quantities are sent to the market daily from the Southern, 

 Western and Middle States, especially to New York city, 

 which receives on some days from the various railroads and 

 steamboats an aggregate of about a himdred thousand bush- 

 els, and all this in addition to the immense quantities canned 

 and distributed to all portions of the globe. 



When I reflect upon the rapid progress of American Pom- 

 ology in my own day, and its salutary influence on the health 

 and happiness of mankind, the more grateful am I to those 

 benevolent men who opened the way for this new era which 

 distinguishes the fruit culture of our country. How grateful 

 to the feelings of all who have worked with us in this prog- 

 ress, is the prospect which opens to us in the great future of 

 our country ! How would Governor Winthrop have rejoiced, 

 when planting his pippin on oui* harbor island ; Peregrine 

 White, when planting his apple-tree at Plymouth ; William 

 Blackstone, when planting his orchard on Boston Common ; 

 Governor Endicott, when planting his pear-tree, which still 

 survives, at Salem, could they have foreseen the influence af 

 their example multiplied into the thousands of orchards, and 

 the millions upon millions of fruits which are produced in 

 our country ! And how would the pioneers of the Massa- 

 chusetts Horticultural Society have exulted, could they have 



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