THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN. 
35 
Such a measure is proper enough, but a compulsory 
inspection affecting the nursery trade of the entire 
country, practically putting a check on the progress of 
the business by measures so severe that they would hold 
even the employees of railroad companies responsible, 
if stock that was not in every way perfect was accepted 
for transportation, would injure a business which is of 
national importance, and which if left to adjust itself in 
these matters, will demonstrate that only the respon¬ 
sible growers and dealers will command the confidence 
of purchasers in every section. If certain states on the 
Pacific coast fear that they will be imposed upon, it is 
within their province to protect themselves as they see 
fit. The nursery business of the country should be 
allowed to proceed untrammeled by unnecessary and 
impracticable legislation, however well intended. 
On this subject American Gardenings'a.ys: “Has a 
state the right to quarantine nursery stock for the purpose 
of keeping out the evils ” Certainly, but it must distin¬ 
guish between those evils which can be kept out and 
those which cannot. Some pests, plant lice, apple-worm, 
apple-scab are so numerous, so small and so widespread 
that quarantine is impossible. The only preventive is 
to prohibit the cultivation of the plants upon which they 
live. And then, these things do not spread upon nursery 
stock alone, but come with the development of the 
orchard. They are necessary evils wherever fruit is 
grown, and when the orchards spread to new regions they 
soon follow. The law can say that a man shall not 
harbor them, but that he shall not allow them to spread 
over the state line—that is absurd. You can not quar¬ 
antine the wind, the rain or the plant lice. But visible 
troubles confined to certain areas, these can be quaran¬ 
tined. Yet the time may not have come for circumspect 
laws for the control of most insects and diseases. 
Perhaps it never will come, except for a few such evils as 
the black-knot, the peach yellows and the gypsy-moth. 
The enactment and enforcement of law depends upon 
the intelligence and enterprise of the people, and when 
this general intelligence comes it is not unlikely that 
public sentiment will be as beneficial as formal laws.” 
The annual meeting of the American Association 
of Nurserymen will be held in Chicago on June 7th. It is 
believed that the added attractions of the World’s Fair 
this year will cause the attendance to be larger than 
ever, especially as the meeting place is so centrally 
located. It has been decided to prepare a list of papers 
to be read and present this to the members after assem¬ 
bling, the programme to be then arranged. This will be 
the most important meeting of nurserymen of the year, 
and no member of the association can afford to miss it. 
The Division of Pomology of the United States 
Department of Agriculture is working with a full force 
under the direction of H. E. Van Deman, pomologist, 
on the revision of the lists of fruits, giving them the 
proper names. Mr. Van Deman hopes during the sum¬ 
mer to be able to issue the apple list upon which the 
division has been working two years. It has been 
thought unwise to publish any list with the numerous 
synonyms unless sufficient time and labor have been ex¬ 
pended to bring them down to date. Nurserymen may 
depend, upon a valuable acquisition to the literature in 
their interests when these lists are out. 
With the opening of new tracts for building pur¬ 
poses and the laying out of park lands, features of public 
and private enterprise which are becoming more and 
more prominent, the demand for ornamental nursery 
stock will increase rapidly. There is doubtless con¬ 
siderable of interest and it may be of profit in 
the article in this number by William Webster on the 
propagation of native forest trees for street planting. If, 
as he argues, advanced prices could be obtained readily 
for such stock, there seems little doubt that the field 
will be occupied. The efforts of forestr}^ associations 
in many cases extend from the preservation of wooded 
lands to the planting of trees in groves and rows in 
barren places, and such improvements of course are of 
direct interest to the wide-awake nurseryman. Superin¬ 
tendent William S. McMillan of the Buffalo park sys¬ 
tem recently called attention to the success achieved 
in planting pine and larch in Scotland, where a plantation 
set out fifty years ago has for twenty years been furnish¬ 
ing timber for England and the continent. 
RETAIL TRADE AS A FIELD FOR COMBINATION. 
To the Editor of The National Nurseryman : 
The articles published in The National Nursery¬ 
man looking to a consolidation of nursery interests, has 
led the writer to review certain movements on the part 
of the retail trade, during the past five or seven years, 
calculated to promote the interests of all employers of 
agents in this business. 
The result has been, we think it can be safely said 
in each case, that the greedy, near-sighted ones in the 
pool or association overbalance the square, level-headed 
ones, and the result has been that the greedy ones have 
benefited by such pooling or combination of rates, while 
the few that lived up to the rules and regulations of 
such combine suffered equal to the gain of the rogues. 
So that it would seem thus far, the average retailer of 
stock is too greedy, jealous, fearing that some one will 
get ahead of him in some way,to join hands and “keep 
hold” on small issues. 
We refer above principally to the repeated efforts to 
establish a uniform amount of commission to be paid 
canvassers for the first month; the establishing of a per¬ 
manent dead beat list of agents, etc. The majority of 
