50 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN. 
Hmong Growers anb Bealers. 
J. Blaauw, Boskoop, Holland, is in New York city. 
Florists report a spring trade largely in excess of last years. 
James Whalen, Watertown, Wis., died April 15, aged 65 
years. 
Nelson Bogue, Batavia, will furnish trees for Belle Isle park, 
Detroit. 
J E. Curtiss, Barre Centre, N. Y. has all kinds of stakes for 
nurserymen. 
J. Koster, of Koster & Co., Boskoop, Holland, arrived in 
New York early in April. 
W. C. Harrison is assistant treasurer of the Storrs & Har¬ 
rison Co., Painesville, O. 
Professor L. H. Bailey of Cornell University is in Europe. 
He will be absent until September. 
Harlan P. Kelsey was elected a member of the Massachu¬ 
setts Horticultural Society last month. 
J. G. Harrison & Sons, Berlin, Md., used 78 cars in dis¬ 
posing of their peach trees this spring. 
Horticulturist H. E. Dosch has secured over 6,000 feet of 
space for Oregon exhibits at the Omaha fair. 
The Paterson, N. J., Park Commission awarded to the Eliza¬ 
beth Nursery Company the contract for furnishing necessary 
trees. 
On April 4th, a bill was introduced in congress incorporat¬ 
ing the Society of American Florists and Ornamental Horti¬ 
culturists. 
Professor J. Ritzema Bos, of Amsterdam, Holland, will be 
sent to the United States soon by the Dutch government to 
study the San Jose scale. 
J. E. Killen, representing C. H. Joosten, the well-known 
importer, of New York city, called on Western New York 
nurserymen early last month. 
The summer meeting of the Missouri Horticultural Society 
will be held this year, as last, upon the dates of the annual 
convention of the American Association. 
The government of Switzerland has prohibited the impor¬ 
tation of American fresh fruits. This action was taken owing 
to the alleged presence of the San Jose scale in the fruit im¬ 
ported recently. 
The San Jose scale scare has passed somewhat and horticul¬ 
turists have wisely concluded that this new pest is no more to 
be feared than many others, says J. W. Sylvester in one of the 
best known farm journals. 
The officers of the Griffing Brothers Company, incorporated, 
are : President, W. D. Griffing ; vice-president and general 
manager, W. C. Griffing ; secretary and treasurer, C. M. Griff¬ 
ing ; superintendent of propagation, A. M. Griffing. 
The seedling apples of Arkansas have nearly all proved very 
satisfactory in California, so far as tried. Nineteen varieties 
originating in that state are thought, by Prof. J. T. Hinson of 
the experiment station, to be worthy of cultivation. 
“Why not send the nurseryman scions of what you want 
and know what you are planting,” says a writer in a horticul¬ 
tural exchange. “Let him send you the trees, grown from 
your own varieties. If they cost more, they will be cheaper in 
the end.” 
Frederic W. Taylor, the well-known horticulturist and 
present superintendent of agriculture and horticulture at the 
Trans-Mississippi and Internal Exposition at Omaha, married 
at Chicago, April 12th, Miss Marion Treat, of the musical 
department of the Nebraska State University at Lincoln, Neb. 
“Whatever the cause,” says A. H. Griesa, Lawrence, Kan., 
“we have too many unproductive varieties, on which we spend 
our hopes, our time, money and years of labor without profit ; 
and were these efforts combined with the best varieties, success 
would crown our years. We have but one life here ; oppor¬ 
tunities come but once. We have time for only our best 
efforts.” 
WHAT MR. FLETCHER SAID. 
Editor of National Nurseryman. 
In your April issue at page 33, I am reported as saying that 
“80 per cent, of Canadian fruit trees were imported from the 
United States.” This, of course, is not the case. The state¬ 
ment I made was that “ Mr. Irving Rouse has told me that 80 
per cent, of the surplus stock of American nurseries was 
shipped into Canada.” My remarks were wrongly reported at 
the time and the statement has appeared in several places sub 
sequently. By inserting this note you will oblige, 
Very truly, 
Ottawa, April 9, 1898. James Fletcher, Entomologist. 
COMMISSIONS IN ENGLAND. 
Replying to a correspondent in the Horticultural Advertiser 
Sydney S. Marshall, nurseryman and florist, Bognor, Sussex 
county, England, writes : 
Your correspondent “Nurseryman,” in discussing Gardeners’ Com¬ 
missions, has raised a very debatable subject. My own opinion is that 
commissions may be given with perfect propriety and without com¬ 
mitting any breach of moral or civil law. If an agent buys in his 
master’s interests and the nurseryman gives him a commission out of 
his own profit, there is no moral wrong, neither would any judge con¬ 
vict unless a conspiracy were proved to exist between the agent and the 
seller to defraud the buyer. If the nurseryman bribes the gardener to 
allow him to overcharge his master, we require no education from 
“ Nurseryman ” or anybody else to affirm that both are swindlers of 
the commonest type, and beyond redemption. I know gentlemen who 
consider their gardeners have a right to a commissson, and would re¬ 
move their custom if it were not paid. It is the method and not the 
principle that is at fault. Are nurserymen to be the only super-sensi¬ 
tive, ultra-moral and sanctimonious traders on the face of the globe ? 
Is there a single business line worth having in any business that some 
trader or other is not perfectly willing and anxious to secure by pay¬ 
ing a reasonable commission. Commissions are doubtless a nuisance, 
and so are weeds. When we can grow stock without weeds, we 
may (this is more than doubtful) sell it without paying commissions. 
In my opinion it is better to know what we are expected to do, and to 
do it, than to attempt a cure that will act only as in a suppressed fever, 
leave the disease in a more complex and dangerous form. Without 
commissions outsiders would come in, and with the energetic stores 
and “Universal Providers,” laugh and grow fat on the good old ante¬ 
diluvian nurserymen, who would doubtless await the end with folded 
hands and complacent resignation. Commissions are in my opinion a 
commercial necessity, although it behooves every trader to get out of 
them as lightly as he can. Nurserymen are much more likely to ruin 
their trade by the broakcast distribution of trade catalogues and prices, 
by which they frequently lose 50 per cent., than to quibble at commis¬ 
sions. With this going on it is “ to save at the spigot and let out at 
the bung-hole.” I would sooner raise prices in earnest than play at 
reducing commissions. 
