228 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



as so great before you in Nebraska, we are only too glad if we can 

 aid you in any way. 



All mankind have appreciated fruit and will continue so to do. 

 From the day when Eve got into trouble by taking an apple which 

 did not belong to her, up to the present, fruit has been a great staple 

 of the world. This is recognized so well that even the Bible adopts 

 the language of the horticulturist and says, " Comfort me with apples/' 

 and prophesies of the days when your Society shall redeem Nebraska 

 from a wilderness to this extent, " In place of this bramble shall 

 spring up the fig tree. 7 ' And it must be that horticulture is one of 

 the most successful pursuits in heaven, for do we not read of gardens 

 of amaranth, etc.? And doesn't it speak of the tree of life which 

 has twelve kinds of fruit? 



This being the case I shall close the discussion. If all good horti- 

 culturists go to heaven you have the Bible on your side, and as I have 

 already shown that you have the agricultural press as your aids, why 

 should you not prosper and be happy ? 



DISCUSSION. 



Brown — I don't believe the editor has got over his youthful long- 

 ing for apples yet ; I noticed when he was at our place he had a very 

 pushing way of investigating if there were any apples in the trees as 

 we were passing through the orchard. 



POTATOES. 



BY JARED G. SMITH. 



Potatoes rank third among the food products of the United States.. 

 They are as much a staple as corn, wheat, or oats. They form the 

 chief fat-producing food of a considerable part of the human race. 



Solarium tuberosum, the potato of the gardens, is a native of America 

 from Mexico to Chili, and a variety, borealis, grows as far north as 

 New Mexico. 



The potato was first introduced into Spain over three centuries ago, 

 and in 1586, by Sir Walter Raleigh, into England. It did not pass 



