200 [Assembly 



in fiict worthies?, on the wholo, so ns to avoiil purchasing lliem. 

 Every gentleman coulil judge for himself what suitcil him, but it was 

 desirable that all shouul be cnableil to profit by the experience of 

 each other. Such was the iilca cntcrtalnetl by the Massachusetts por- 

 tion of the committee, anil on that principle its report hail been raaile. 

 As to its reliability, he thought that a uniform experience of ten, fif- 

 teen, or twenty years, was pretty good authority. If the Congress 

 should agree to strike ofl* one in every ten proposed in the report, he 

 should be as satisfied as though it were adopted entire, for he sliould 

 consider that a large gain had been attained. But if gentlemen were 

 still determined to go through an experiment individually with all 

 varieties of fruits, whether proposed to be rejected or not, why then^ 

 Ml the collective experience here would simply go for nothing. Every 

 body could try and judge for himself on each fruit presented ; but it 

 was to afford each one the benefit of the collecllvc experience of the 

 whole mass, that this assemblage of Fruit Growers l.ad come into ex- 

 istence. Mr. Walker said he differed from his friend, (Mr. FnEKai)^ 

 as to the Buffura pear, and placed it side by side with the St. MlKhael. 



Mr. Hayes wished to give all parts of the Union the advantage of 

 proving arid profiting by the decisions of the Congress. If a list 

 of -best fruits were established and published, they would have that 

 .benefit. J^et an approved list be first given out, and then as we went 

 on, w€ might come down to poorer and poorer, till we satisfactorily 

 arrived at tuch as were not worthy of any attention at all. 



Mr. Barby^ of New-York, said that In regard to this llstj many gen- 

 tlemen jnight' hear the names of varieties of which they knew abso- 

 lutely nolhin^, and as to which, of course, they could not judge from 

 experience. He knew nothing of these four pears, but was willing to 

 reject them alf on the testimony of those who did. Now, this was a list 

 from Massachui?etts j these fruits were worthless there, and if they should 

 be cast out of cultivation in that State, in consequence cf the adop- 

 tion of the list, some o::e good purpose at least would be effected. 



Mr. IlA^ccck thought that Mr. French misapprehended the slate 

 of the question. He did not, himself, consider this as a list of^frults 

 rejected by this Cangress, but only a list of those rejected so far as 

 cultivation In Mnssnchusetts was concerned. It was prepared for that 

 State, and would, he supposed, be followed up by similar reports from 

 (Other States in different parts of the land. He conceived this to be 



