328 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



it good ; very many would obtain seed, and it may be that in 

 another season hundreds may be giving time, ground and ma- 

 nure, to determine a question that could bo decided by the 

 committee most speedily. These gourds came under the notice 

 of your committee, and as the information above mentioned was 

 all the facts that could be obtained in answer to their interroga- 

 tions, they determined to take the liberty to interrogate the 

 gourds themselves. On doing so, found them to be a bitter, 

 repulsive fruit, certainly utterly worthless, and possibly, like 

 the bottle gourd, more or less poisonous. An additional argu. 

 ment for the end sought, is the fact that the seed of new pro- 

 ducts issue yearly from the great head of the progressive agri- 

 culture of this land, the Patent Office, to determine the merits 

 •f which intelligent farmers both need and desire the aid of 

 some responsible, disinterested body. It seems to the chairman, 

 therefore, that if the committee on vegetables have the power 

 conceded to them in the programme, to test, in whatever way 

 they may think proper, the quality of any article on exhibition, 

 an imputation will thus be removed from the practical workings 

 of our exhibitions ; the committee will feel that they are not 

 engaged in a mere farce, and their report will be more satisfac- 

 tory to themselves, and of more interest and value to those into 

 whose hands it may fall. 



Before closing this portion of our report, we would dwell for 

 a moment on the instincts of this most interesting family of 

 plants ; to him who loves nature beyond her mere pecuniary 

 value, they will amply repay a careful study. We once observed 

 a squash vine, which had extended itself horizontally about ten 

 feet, pass under a pear tree, the lowest branch of which was 

 three and a half feet from the ground ; here, without any means 

 of support, it lifted itself nearly vertically towards the tree, 

 until it had almost reached the branch, when gravity proved 

 too powerful for its watery structure, and it fell in an arch to 

 the earth. Not satisfied with this result, it tried a second and 

 third time, with like success as at the first attempt, making 

 three arches, which carried it beyond the tree, when it con- 

 tinued, as before, its horizontal growth. Did not the vine knoiu 

 that the tree was above it, and by what means did it know the 

 fact ? Becoming specially interested in its instincts, I tested 

 them still farther, by plai ting stakes a little to the right or left 



