REPORTS OF DELEGATES. 319 



few experiments seem to indicate that this important crop 

 would succeed. Strawberries, whortleberries, and blackberries 

 are eminently worthy of trial. Of this latter berry, I was told 

 that upwards of three hundred bushels were imported* the past 

 season. The best use, I believe, to which the area of sandy 

 soil after all may be applied, is to the growing of wood. Some 

 five hundred acres have already been planted with pines, and 

 for the four or five years that they have been growing they are 

 certainly exceedingly promising. There is no natural wood to 

 be found upon any part of the island, although Capt. E. W. 

 Gardner, in excavating for peat, struck some quite large stumps 

 of trees, indicating that at some former period there must have 

 been at least a few forest trees of goodly size. This entire 

 absence of wood makes it necessary to go abroad for that 

 material for all purposes to which it is applied. There is neither 

 wood for fences nor stone for walls. 



A smaller portion of the island is covered with a soil of a 

 different character, being composed in part of clay, and here, 

 it seems to me, is to be found the source of future agricultural 

 prosperity. That it is capable of the highest and most success- 

 ful cultivation, a glance at the products exhibited in the hall 

 affords abundant evidence. Field beets, turnips, and other 

 roots, as fine as can be raised in the State, adorned the tables. 

 Onions of the finest quality, were on exhibition, which vrere taken 

 from a field yielding at the rate of eight hundred bushels to the 

 acre. Good crops of corn and grain were represented by fine 

 specimens, and the same quality of land upon which they were 

 grown has produced the past season three, and even as high as 

 four, estimated, tons of hay to the acre as a first crop. In the 

 department of fruits there were quinces, unexcelled, perhaps, 

 in the world, certainly in my limited experience. Pears, of 

 large size and fine quality, though most of them wore a russet 

 coat. The Flemish Beauty, in particular, was completely 

 covered, in many cases, with a fine russet. The same tendency 

 was observed in apples, of which I saw very good specimens, 

 particularly the Rhode Island Greening. The advance made 

 since attention has been directed to pear culture, may be 

 appreciated when it is stated that ten or eleven years ago there 

 were but three pear trees on the island. Unusually fine speci- 

 mens of Isabella grapes, and good clusters of Diana, were 



