79 



famous cabbage, the Stone Mason, was originated by John 

 Mason, who later in life, purchased and passed the re- 

 mainder of his days on one of the best farms in Amesbury, 

 which is situated on the borders of the lake made ever 

 celebrated by Whittier's poem, Maids of Attitash. 

 "In sky and wave the white clouds swam, 



And the blue hills of Nottingham 

 Through gaps^of leafy green 

 Across the lake were seen." 



Mr. Warren's onion crop was at the time of our visit 

 completely dried^down, of good size, very thick and of 

 extra fine quality. 



We are sorry to report that Mr. Warren decided not to 

 put in his statement. In this connection the Committee 

 wish to call the attention of the trustees to the rule, — "In 

 ascertaining the amount of crop, any vessel may be used 

 and the weight of its contents once, multiplied by the 

 number of times it is filled by the crop." There are some 

 crops in this department, such as carrots, parsnips, and es- 

 pecially, cabbage, that it is impracticable to get at the 

 amount of the crop in this way; these crops are not generally 

 harvested at the time when the statements are called for 

 (Nov. 1st,), thus we did not attempt to hold these crops to 

 the rule. We believe there should be some definite method 

 to guide the Committee in the future, in like cases. In re- 

 gard to onions, it is the practice of many who wish to keep 

 them for winter marketing, to store them with the tops 

 on, so it is quite a task to correctly compute the crop ac- 

 cording to this rule— this, as we understand, was the 

 cause of Mr. Warren's failure to put in his statement. 



On returning from Mr. Warren's we saw Mr. Kent's 

 field of onions at Newburyport, most of which were of 

 good quality, the right size, but not quite as ripe at that 

 time as the average crops this season. In order to make 

 an half acre (the required area) he had to put in some 

 twenty rods of new land which materially reduces his 

 yield. It was quite evident that on Sept. 3, we undertook 

 to accomplish too much work and to go over too much ter- 



