GENERAL DISCUSSION ON FRUIT. 31 



exhibited ; with the result that the best only survives the test to 

 which it is subjected. It is amusing sometimes to notice how 

 one's si^ecimens of fruit, which seem so large and fair in the 

 owner's home, shrink upon being placed upon the exhibition 

 tables. 



Mr. Wood said that he knew of nothing today upon which a 

 young man could enter with more hope of success with the least 

 outlay of money than the cultivation of apples. In all the aban- 

 doned farms he had seen not one had a thrifty orchard upon it. 

 Even if one should not live to see the results it will add to the 

 value of the farm in the closing up of an estate, and there is 

 nothing that will help the sale of a farm better than a prosperous 

 orchard. How many orchards are seen everywhere showing 

 neglect and want of care, and treated only as an incidental crop. 



At a farmers' meeting a few years ago in a town in the central 

 part of the state one of the auditors arose and said that the 

 farmers in that section had been advised to grow apples ; now 

 they would like to be told how to sell them. It was a year 

 when the crop was large and the returns discouragingly poor. 



Dr. Fisher, who was at the meeting, was asked to reply. He 

 said that he had grown apples for thirty-four years and had 

 always received a satisfactory piice. He had always found that 

 good quality fi'uit brought a good price. He grew only three 

 varieties, Hubbardston, Rhode Island Greening, and Baldwin. 

 He thinned his fruit and had at the time two hundred barrels 

 which he proposed to sell the first of February. The market 

 price for ordinary apples was thep seventy-five cents to one dol- 

 lar and twenty-five cents a barrel. 



Mr. Wood met the Doctor the next year and asked him what 

 he obtained for his apples. Dr. Fisher replied that he sold his 

 Rhode Island Greenings in New York, where there was a better 

 market, for $3.25 per barrel, and his BaldA^-ins and Plubbardstons 

 in Boston, for $3.00. 



There is no crop that can be grown with so little fertihzing 

 and with so little expense in cultivation as the apple, and there is 

 no reason why a farmer cannot have a good crop and find a mar- 

 ket at a good price. 



To get good fruit it must be thinned in early summer. It may 



