3o8 Notes and Gleanings. 



The Peach Trade of New York. — The New York Semi-Weekly Times 

 has an article, in which it is said, " The entire system of handling peaches is 

 arranged so admirably to favor the pecuniary interest of middlemen who sell the 

 fruit, that in some instances the consignees take the fruit, sell it, pocket most of 

 the money, return the producer his baskets and crates, and a bill for freight and 

 commission over and above the aggregate sum declared to have been received 

 for the entire cargo. Such an occurrence is by no means uncommon, as middle- 

 men have everything their own way. They all operate as a unit to get the 

 fruit at the lowest possible figure, and to make as much profit on the repeated 

 sales of the same fruit as possible, before the supplies are purchased by-con- 

 sumers. Hence the money made in the peach traffic is snapped up by a few 

 operators, who usually appropriate only a few hours per day at their livelihood, 

 realizing during the brief space of time enormous profits." It is further stated 

 that the fruit arrives at Jersey City at two to three o'clock in the morning, when 

 the car is opened by the consignee, who seldom dwells long in effecting sales. 

 The buyers are not very numerous, and seldom disposed to bid against each 

 other. The sales are soon made to these dealers, who hurry away the fruit to 

 New York or Brooklyn, and sell it at an advance of two, three, or four hun- 

 dred per cent. In many instances large dealers will have a confederate, who is 

 really a member of their firm, though not known to the public as such. To this 

 confederate they sell the fruit consigned to them at half or less of its real value, 

 receiving their share of the profits of from three to four hundred per cent. The 

 result is that fruit, for which the buyer gets forty cents per basket, with commis- 

 sions deducted from that, is sold to consumers at two dollars or more per basket, 

 and orders from surrounding towns are filled with fruit that cost forty cents per 

 basket in Jersey City, and four to five dollars per crate is charged for it. The 

 practical remedy, it is said, is for producers to employ one of theirnumberto sell 

 their fruit. Most peaches are now sold from small places that are rented at about 

 one dollar to one dollar and a half per day. The sales are closed out each day, 

 so there is no stock on hand to find storage for. By thus renting a cheap stand 

 in New York, and handling their own fruit, a large part of the profits that now 

 go to middlemen might be saved. " Then a producer having a cargo of fine 

 fruit, could calculate with satisfactory certainty about how much he would real- 

 ize for his crop before shipping it." Now, it is further said, with " the present 

 tricky and underhand manner of selling on commission, middlemen keep the 

 prices constantly fluctuating, when the rates might be, with fair and straightfor- 

 ward management, as uniform, and trade as steady, as the prices of coffee and 

 sugar. Retail prices continue quite uniform from day to day, and there is no 

 reason why wholesale rates should be reported at forty cents per basket to- 

 day and eighty cents to-morrow, only that heavy operators realize greater profits, 

 in consequence of the fluctuations." 



Jute. — Plants of jute grew last year in three months ten feet high on the 

 banks of the Lower Mississippi, and this too with little or no cultivation. They 

 fully matured, and produced abundance of seed, thus showing that jute can be 

 grown throughout all the sugar-growing portions of this valley. 



Illustrated Journal of Agriculture. 



