THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 185 



is occasioned to both spectators and judges, and additional trouble and 

 expense to exhibitors. 



T.et a first, second, third, and in some cases a fourth prize be 

 oli'ered for so many specimens of each desirable variety. Commence 

 then at one end of the table with all the competing specimens of the 

 earliest fruit, and then the same with the second earliest, and so on 

 to the latest. And let there be no grouping of the four best cooking, 

 and tlie six best cooking, and the ten best cooking, which must in any 

 case only be a repetition of what has been seen in the one variety 

 class, with the disadvantage that inferior specimens frequently take 

 prizes because shown " in group" with extraordinary fine specimens of 

 other kinds. This plan may have its faults, as indeed what plan has 

 not ? but it certainly has the merit of simplicity. 



Tlie object of our exhil)itions should be, and I hope is, to encourage 

 the growtli of the best fruits, &c., which our soil and climate are 

 capable of producing ; and the m^-nufacture of the best and most 

 useful articles that our manufacturers can supply ; Imt as regards the 

 products of the soil, whether they take the shape of fruit, grain or live 

 stock, it does not follow because the absolutely best cannot be pro- 

 duced that the best should not be striven for and encouraged. It 

 does not follow that because the best quality of fruit or grain cannot 

 be grown in any particular county or district, that no fruit or grain 

 should be grown there at all, and yet as our exhibitions are conducted 

 the whole of the encouragement in the shape of prizes and medals 

 goes to the favored sections, while others a little less favored by 

 climate or soil are left out in the cold, on the principle, I suppose, 

 that " he that hath to him shall be given." The plan of exhibition 1 

 have sketched out above is open to this objection in common witii 

 the one hitherto followed. Tl.is is one of its faults, and another which 

 applies to all of these great exhibitions is, that a few skilled orchard- 

 ists, farmers, stock breeders, &c., are stimulated and forced, into a sort 

 of hot-bed growth, and become a favored class — a sort of aristocracy 

 amoiig producers. But they do not carry the bone and sinew of the 

 CQuntry with them ; they outstrip the great mass of producers so far 

 that there is really no competition, and the multitude fall back into 

 their ohl grooves again. Now what I would like to see is to have the 

 stimulus to improvement localized as much as possible — brought home 

 as it were to our own counties and townships, and us near as possible 



