1893.] TRANSACTIONS. 13 



White Imperial, Beers's Late Rareripe, Bonaparte, Late Admira- 

 ble, Morris Red Rareripe, Yellow Albergc, Blood, Morris White, 

 Rareripe Seedling, Bulhird's Seedling, Yellow Melocoton. Of 

 tliat Exhibition, as a whole, that careful and conscientious Judge, 

 the late Dr. William Workman, to whose diligent service upon 

 its Committees the Society was so much indebted in its infancy, 

 declared with unwonted emphasis: 



" We have had no show of Peaches in any previous year that 

 would at all compare with the magnificent display of that luscious 

 fruit collected on our tables this year." 



Ten years later, the elder Salisbury, in his Report upon our 

 Grapes, Peaches, &c., &c., utters the subjoined wailing note : 



" It is the melancholy duty of the Committee to ask the par- 

 ticular attention of the Society to the specimens presented of the 

 most delicious of all fruits, the Peach ; and first, thanks must be 

 offered to the contributors who, under the discouragement of an 

 unpropitious season, with extraordinary public spirit, have ofiered 

 the Peaches on your tables which, as in the case of some other 

 farmers' families, are more excellent in their pedigree than in 

 themselves. . . . The disease called the Yellows has con- 

 tinued its destructive course, and it is still a mystery to the most 

 skilful observers of vegetable life." 



A. D. 1866, Judge Francis H. Dewey, from the same Com- 

 mittee, reported : 



" The Committee deeply regret that their labors were greatly 

 diminished, owing to the reduced number of entries. The severe 

 weather of last winter had been especially injurious to the fruits 

 coming within their jurisdiction. Of Peaches, not a single speci- 

 men was presented," &c., &c. 



Our latest winter was as severe as that to which Judge Dewey 

 referred, but yet on the 21st of last September, the display of 

 Peaches in our Hall was of singular excellence and variety. It 

 must be confessed, however, that the Yellows betrayed its pres- 

 ence in the mottled skin of many specimens, otherwise promis- 

 ing ; although by their side were other lots immaculate in appear- 

 ance and of manifestly untainted texture. Are we careful to 

 plant pits that are free from disease ? Of course, there cannot 

 be absolute certainty ; but then it rests with ourselves alone 



