STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 89 



Secretary Knowlton followed and briefly referred to tbe ease with 

 -which enough fruit for the family can be raised. Set strawberry 

 plants in long rows three or four feet apart, and let the old horse 

 diaw the cultivator through the first season as often as once every 

 week or ten dajs. Pinch off the blossoms and the early runners. 

 Then if you don't want to do more, the plants will take care of 

 themselves, and the following year without any care will bear a good 

 crop of berries. In the interior of the Slate mulching is not neces- 

 sary. The snow is a good mulch and will hold the plants in place. 

 Near the coast mulching is necessary, and in the interior it will do 

 no haim. He spoke in praise of the Bubach and Haverland ; the 

 latter the past year was a great fovorite with him. Tbe berries were 

 large and of^fine flavor, while the vines are strong growers and free 

 from rust and blight. 



AT THE UNION WINTER MEETING. 



THE ADDRESS OF WELCOME. 

 By H. M. Lord, Rockland. 

 3Ir. President,^ Ladies and Gentlemen: 



It is rather a peculiar and rather a unique task imposed upon me 

 to-day, that of welcoming a convention of agriculturists, the Maine 

 Slate Pomological Society and its kindred organization, the State 

 Board of Agriculture. I say a unique task, inasmuch as I am not 

 a fruit grower in any sense of the term or even an agriculturist unless 

 it may be in some very liberal interpretation of the term. I am a 

 reprtsentative of that great class, the consumers, and the consumer 

 has, or should have, a more vital appreciation of anything produced 

 by Maine than the producer himself. So it may be from some euch 

 reason as this that I am selected to extend to these two societies the 

 sincere words of greeting which at their best inadequately express 

 what fills the hearts of all those who live in this part of the State. The 

 appreciation of the work that this society has done and is doing is 

 notconfined within the limits of the State of Maine, for so far as the 

 reputation of Maine products has extended just so far has the repu- 

 tation of these two organizations reached. And who shall attempt to 



