386 Festival of the 



The Genealogical Tree — An exotic from the shores of Old England. New England 

 will always cherish it whilst it produces a Winlhrop. 



To this sentiment, the Hon. Mr. Winthrop responded in a humorous 

 speech, which, though rather too long for our space, we cannot well 

 abridge : — 



" I am greatly honored, Mr. President, by the sentiment which you have 

 just offered, and I beg the ladies and gentlemen before me to accept my 

 most grateful acknowledgments for the kindness and cordiality with which 

 they have responded to it. I heartily wish that the compliment were better 

 deserved. I wish that even in reference to matters of Horticulture, I had 

 done more to keep up the credit of that old Genealogical Tree. One of 

 your anniversary orators told us some years ago, if I remember rightly, that 

 among the earliest records in regard to the production of fruit in this neigh- 

 borhood, was the account of " a good store of pippins," which was forth- 

 coming upon some occasion from Governor Winthrop's garden. It would 

 be thought no great things to raise a good store of pippins now a days, I 

 suppose. But two hundred years ago it must have been something of an 

 achievement. Our fathers had not many apples to regale themselves with. 

 The fruits to which they were obliged to turn their attention, were of a 

 more substantial and practical character. There is an old song still extant, 

 entitled "Forefather's Song," supposed to have been written in 1630, or 

 thereabouts, which gives us an amusing insight into the horticultural labors 

 of those early days, and shows us what products of the soil were mainly 

 relied upon both for refreshment and nourishment. One of the verses is on 

 this wise : 



" Instead of pottage and puddings, and custards and pies, 

 Our pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies 5 

 We have pumpkins at morning, and pumpkins at noon, 

 If it was not for pumpkins we should be undone." 



Nor did the praises of the pumpkin end here. Our fathers seemed to 

 have found in it an ingredient of one of their choicest drinks, as well as the 

 material of so much of their more solid food. They had no grapes from 

 which " to crush the sweet poison of misused wine ;" and yet, with all their 

 other virtues, they do not appear to have learned how to carry through a 

 feast, as we are now doing, upon cold water. Another verse of the old 

 song says : 



" If barley be wanting to make mto malt, 

 We must be contented and think it no fault 5 

 For we can make liquor to sweeten our lips, 

 Of pumpkins and parsnips, and walnut-tree chips." 



That must have been a lip-sweetener indeed, Mr. President ! We have 

 all heard of bran bread ; and even saw-dust has not been without its com- 

 mendations in some quarters as a valuable esculent; but neither the Genius 

 of Temperance nor of Dyspepsia, has ever, in our time, conceived the 

 idea of extracting an agreeable beverage from pumpkins and parsnips, and 

 walnut-tree chips ! 



