834 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
NOV. 28 
The following appeared in The American 
Florist of October 29: 
“Afraid to Tell the Truth.” 
“The following note appeared as an edi¬ 
torial in The Rural New-Yorker Octo¬ 
ber 17: 
“ * The committee on nomenclature of the 
American Florists’ Society are evidently 
timid about saying anything that might 
offend any one. ‘ In examining our florists’ 
catalogues,’ the report states, ‘ your com¬ 
mittee has found it a difficult matter to 
And out many mistakes intentionally com¬ 
mitted, with the view to deceive and de¬ 
fraud.’ Great conscience! Majn’twe as¬ 
sume that florists who will manufact¬ 
ure names for their ‘ novelties’ will lie as 
to the Intention t The fact is, dear com¬ 
mittee, you are either afraid to tell the 
truth, or are unwilling to incur the dis¬ 
pleasure of your associates by a candid 
exposure of their ‘ unintentional mis¬ 
takes.’ ” 
“The above remarks are unmerited and 
unjust. 
“ In a letter to The R. N.-Y. last spring I 
appealed to its readers for information 
about any plant grown in their neighbor¬ 
hood under two or more names, and also 
asked them to notify the committee of any 
case they knew in which a plant had been 
sold under a false name or under two or 
more names, that the matter might be in¬ 
vestigated. Quoting from another letter 
of mine, in which I asked to be informed of 
any instance wherein a dealer or florist 
misnamed a plant intentionally for some 
selfish or mercenary motive, that we might 
bring his sin to the knowledge of the world, 
The R. N.-Y. urged its readers to help us 
in these words: 
“ * The R. N.-Y. appeals to its readers to 
render what assistance they may to aid the 
good work.’ ” “ Further, believing The R. 
N.-Y. to be actively interested in this sort 
of work, and on the strength of many years 
of warm personal friendship between its 
editor and myself, I appealed to him as an 
individual, i olicitlng nis aid in this nomen¬ 
clature business. His reply was kind and 
c eons, but he did not bring any case to 
my notice. Now, if The R. N.-Y. was 
fraught with facts regarding fraudulent 
nomenclature by florist frauds, why didn’t 
it let us have them when we asked for 
them ? And I here declare that not one of 
its readers has brought a case to my notice 
that has not been promptly, pointedly and 
fearlessly investigated, and I challenge 
proof to the contrary. 
“No, we do not assume that any florist 
lies. We deal with facts as we know them 
to be facts. 
“The statement that ‘you are either 
afraid to tell the truth or unwilling to in¬ 
cur the displeasure of your associates by a 
candid exposure of their ‘ unintentional 
mistakes,’ without giving a particle of 
evidence to sustain it, is, in my opinion, a 
cowardly act; anyway, it is untrue.” 
WILLIAM FALCONER, 
“ Chairman of the Committee on Nomencla¬ 
ture, S. A. F., for 1891.” 
The following is The R. N.-Y.’s reply 
which appears in the American Florist of 
November 12. 
“Afraid to Tell the Truth.” 
On or about October 18 The Rural New- 
Yorker received manuscript from Mr. 
Wm. Falconer of the same article which 
appears in your issue dated October 29, 
page 253. I replied at once that the article 
would be printed as written if he so in¬ 
sisted, but that I hoped, for several reasons 
given, that he would prefer to omit the 
sentence which accuees The R. N.-Y., of 
“a cowardly act.” One of these reasons 
was that in a note to me, written several 
months ago, Mr. F., stated that the results 
of the committee’s investigations would 
astound the public. Replying to this, I 
begged that he would furnish us with the 
particulars of these revelations at the 
earliest possible date, that we might pre¬ 
sent them to our readers. No reply was 
received, and I was left to infer that we 
must wait for them until they should ap¬ 
pear in the society’s proceedings. 
The appearance of Mr. Falconer’s article 
under the above caption (page 252) is the 
only intimation I have had that he declined 
to modify it in any way. 
Mr. Falconer says that he “appealed to 
The R. N.-Y., and to its readers for infor¬ 
mation about any plant grown under two 
names or more, * * * or any instance 
wherein a dealer or florist misnamed a plant 
intentionally for selfish or mercenary mo¬ 
tives.” Further than this, “bellevingTHE 
R. N.-Y., to be actively interested in this 
sort of work, I personally appealed to the 
editor as an individual, soliciting his aid in 
this nomenclature business ” 
“ His reply,” Mr. F. continues, “ was 
courteous, but he did not bring any case to 
my notice.” The appeal, however, was 
promptly placed before our readers, and 
their cordial ccbperation urgently solicited. 
Mr. F. has been a valued contributor to 
The R. N.-Y., for many years, and has dur¬ 
ing the entire period been a careful reader 
of its contents. If there has been one thing 
more than another that during my editor¬ 
ial life of 20 years I have without fear or 
favor endeavored to expose and condemn, 
it has been the rascally practice of certain 
seedsmen, nurserymen, etc., of misrepre¬ 
senting the wares they have offered to the 
people, either by grossly exaggerated or ab¬ 
solutely false claims, or by the use of new 
names to accelerate the sale of old things. 
If the American Florist were willing to 
print a list of such instances I would gladly 
furnish it. That examples of this charac¬ 
ter during the past year have not been 
wanting, the fact that The R. N.-Y., has 
been sued for $75,000 by a prominent seeds¬ 
man and florist may be cited in evidence. 
Ever since the committee on nomencla¬ 
ture of the S. A. F. f was announced, every 
instance worthy of note of such violations 
of honorable business methods that have 
come to my notice has been presented in 
The R. N.-Y., and denounced. Have these 
instances escaped Mr. Falconer ? By no 
means. I have several letters from him, 
some of which commend, some of which 
criticise these exposures. As in this way 
every case of false naming, etc., that I have 
known about has been promptly printed in 
The R. N.-Y., and as Mr. F. has read every 
one of them, it will appear that it would 
have been a needless task to rewrite what 
the chairman of the committee was already 
quite familiar with. 
Since the committee’s report, which in¬ 
formed us that it “had found it a difficult 
matter to find out mistakes intentionally 
committed with a view to deceive and de¬ 
fraud,” I have sought information from 
several leading members of the S. A. F., 
whose names I have—at present, at any rate 
—no right to divulge. “ Why is it,” I ask¬ 
ed, “that the committee did not publish 
the whole truth ?” The replies were in sub¬ 
stance, “ The committee does not dare to do 
so. It would result in a breaking up of the 
society or in libel suits which it could not 
stand. Every member of the committee 
knows this and feels that he has been en¬ 
gaged In a work, the ugly parts of which 
must be smoothed over or suppressed.” 
The objectionable editorial note in The 
R. N.-Y., which the chairman quotes, was, 
therefore, written with the view of saying 
what the committee, for reasons of policy, 
did not deem it judicious to say. The com¬ 
mittee, we assumed, gave greater weight 
to the necessity of maintaining an entente 
cordiale’than by telling unpalatable truths 
to endanger the union and harmony of the 
society. 
We have made no charge that the com¬ 
mittee was not “ prompt and fearless in its 
investigations.” The charge is that it has 
not promptly and fearlessly presented the 
results to the public. 
That there is anything “ untrue” or 
“cowardly” in The R. N.-Y.’s position 
must rest upon other evidence than the 
assertion of the accomplished chairman of 
the committee on nomenclature of the 
worthy Society of American Florists. 
E. S. CARMAN. 
The Am. Florist comments as follows : 
“The sentence in the nomenclature com¬ 
mittee’s report, that has so greatly disap¬ 
pointed The R. N.-Y., will be heartily in¬ 
dorsed by every fair-minded florist in the 
country, certainly the Florist indorses it, 
and we do pretend to have considerable 
means of knowing something about the 
florists and the florist business in this coun¬ 
try. And while Mr. F. was reading from 
his report before the S. A. F., at the con¬ 
vention at Toronto, his audience right 
there and then applauded that very sen¬ 
tence. They knew the truth, and they 
were neither slow nor afraid to show their 
appreciation of the truth. 
“ The present report of the nomenclature 
committee is one of the most vigorous and 
substantial papers ever presented to the 
society, a paper from first to last filled with 
solid common sense. 
“ Mr. F.’s letter was mailed to us Thurs¬ 
day, October 15, and he informed us that he 
had mailed an identical letter to the editor 
of The R. N.-Y., the same day in New 
York city. No doubt, whatever facts Mr. 
F. has gleaned from The R. N.-Y., have 
been made good use of by him. The Florist 
is perfectly willing to publish facts about 
frauds perpetrated by florists, but they 
must be substantiated facts. According to 
circulars freely distributed at the agricul¬ 
tural fairs this fall, we were told The R. 
N.-Y., was being sued for $150,000; there’s 
a big difference between that amount and 
$75,000. 
“From what we know of Mr. F. we are 
satisfied that he is both able and willing to 
abide by every word he has written in priv 
ate correspondence or public print. 
“ The committee have treated the whole 
matter in a gentlemanly, straightforward 
and forcible manner, and they have not 
catered to any morbid taste or curiosity. 
In fact, they one and all ill-deserve the 
charge made by The R. N.-Y., that they are 
afraid to tell the truth. They were ap¬ 
pointed by the S. A. F., to handle the 
nomenclature question. They are the ser¬ 
vants of the S. A. F.; they are responsible 
to the S. A. F., and the S. A. F. are highly 
satisfied with the way and manner in which 
they have performed their duties and the 
work they have accomplished, and espec¬ 
ially do they appreciate the labors of the 
chairman of the committee. And we are 
strongly of the opinion that any * assertion ’ 
made by the chairman will not only receive 
the ready indorsement of every one of his 
colleagues, but the S. A. F. at large as well, 
The R. N.-Y., notwithstanding. 
“The florists of America are not the 
thieves, robbers and blacklegs some folks 
would fain paint them; they are a hard¬ 
working, honest and honorable people, and 
we t>re proud of them. And we rejoice to 
know that after the strictest investigations 
made by a committee of the most uncom¬ 
promising practical florists in the country, 
they ‘found it a difficult matter to find 
out many mistakes intentionally commit¬ 
ted.’ Our correspondent will please observe 
that he has, for some reason or other known 
to himself, probably, omitted the word 
‘ many ’ in his quotation.” 
To the above remarks of the editor of the 
American Florist the following reply has 
been forwarded to that paper. 
“Afraid to Tell the Truth.” 
Referring to your comments upon my an¬ 
swer to Mr. Falconer (page 306), permit me 
to say that The Rural New Yorker Is, 
indetd, being sued for $150,000; for $75,000 
by a Long Island florist and seedsman, and 
for $75,000 by a country trading associ¬ 
ation of this city—both libel suits. The 
first case was mentioned simply because 
the prosecutor is a florist and seedsman. 
The omission of the word “ many ” was 
unintentional. It will appear, however, 
that the sense is not thereby materially 
changed. 
I heartily agree with you that the “ flor¬ 
ists of America are a hardworking, honora¬ 
ble people ” and that we have all reason 
“ to feel proud of them,” as a class. No 
stronger reason could be given why the 
black sheep should be fearlessly shown up 
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