56 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OX VEGETABLES, 



For the Year 1863. 



BY DANIEL T. CURTIS, CHAIRMAN. 



Since the year 1854, this department, as shown by its records, has been 

 represented by no less than two hundred contributors. During^ the intervening 

 period there has been a steady increase both in the number and value of con- 

 tributions, denoting a corresponding degree of progress and interest in the 

 specific branch of culture to which it is devoted. 



This period has been one of change as well as of improvement, and marked 

 by the breaking up of old and cherished associations, as well as the formation 

 of new and pleasant ones. While the accession in numbers has been largely of 

 that class of amateur cultivators whose zeal in pushing forward experiments and 

 researches was stimulated by the novelty of the pursuit — thus giving freshness 

 and vigor to the operations of the Society — the veterans, whose early and un- 

 aided efforts sustained the interest of this department in its earlier years, have 

 been gradually retiring from the field, content to resign the more active duties 

 of the Association into younger and more ambitious hands. 



The past year has been one of general success in nearly every branch of 

 ao-riculture, and the Society's exhibitions have not been wanting in fine speci- 

 mens of the esculent vegetable kingdom. It is true, that early in the season 

 there was an apparent tardiness in bringing forward these products at the 

 time appointed for the investigations of the Committee in reference to the 

 award of premiums ; but they are happy to say, that this delay was not the 

 result of any lack of interest on the part of contributors, but rather of the 

 protracted drought, followed by copious rains, which retarded the growth and 

 maturity of many early vegetables. These, however, were gathered in 

 greater abundance than expected, at a later period of the season, (which was 

 necessarily a short one for this class of produce,) and the market fairly sup- 

 plied. Indeed, so pressing was the demand and remunerative the price real- 

 ized for the early vegetable crops, that many of our most enterprising suburban 

 cultivators could not — with the scarcity of labor required for rapidly develop- 

 mtr and marketing their supplies — find time to bestow that attention upon the 

 weekly exhibitions of the Society which they would have been glad to do for 

 the promotion of its interests. 



The largely increased and liberal encouragement now given to this branch 

 of vegetable culture, which renders it one of the most lucrative in the scope 

 of husbandry, should, and doubtless will, direct a larger share of attention and 

 systematic effort to the production of early esculents. In order to meet the 

 requirements of the market, in this climate, all the artificial appliances favor- 

 ing precocious vegetable growth, and for anticipating our tardy spring time» 



