THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN. 
75 
ties has an element of humor ? It reminds me of the debut that the 
young woman makes into society, with all the fanfaronade of new 
bonnets and shiny ribbons and writeups in the newspapers. And the 
next year the debutante is forgotten and others take her place. Now 
and then a woman comes into recognition for her womanly traits or her 
good deeds or her strong personality, and when we look up her history, 
behold ! she was never ‘ introduced” at all ! 
Now I believe in “novelties.” There are essays of mine in your pro¬ 
ceedings to attest that fact. Without novelties there is no progress. 
But we must all be cognizant of the fact that nine-tenths of the red-ink 
novelties never “stick.” Certainly these nine tenths do not represent 
progress. Now, it is a fact that the people are suspicious of novelties 
Who buys the new apple or the new pear or the new tomato that has 
every merit and lacks every fault ? Does the experienced planter put 
out a farm of them, that he may reap the rewards thereof ? Or does 
the cautious buyer and the amateur here and there buy sparingly to 
see what they are like ? 
I sometimes wonder whether we are not in a tr insition epoch in our 
horticulture, when “something new” seems to be the end of our desire 
and effort. And are we 
not going to pass this 
epoch before long, and 
come into a real love of 
good plants, whether they 
are as old as the hills or 
as new as tomorrow? 
Then, again, I sometimes 
wonder whether the nov¬ 
elty-feature really does 
represent the tastes and 
desires of the people. 
Everywhere I find persons 
w a nt i n g the good old 
things, that never lose 
their face-powder and that 
are hallowed by every 
sweet memory ; but if one 
wants to buy them he 
must search patiently 
through the fine print in 
the catalogues. Now, I 
believe that every good 
novelty should be adver¬ 
tised for “all there is in 
it”; but the difficulty is 
that there are so many 
novelties with such superb 
par-excellencies that no 
one knows how or when 
t,o d i sc rim i nate. This 
playful skit I make with 
no feeling of criticism and 
with no thought of laying 
any blame on the catalogue-man, but only to call your attention to 
a tendency of the times that I believe is overworked. May not an 
over-exploiting of novelties stand in the way of really introducing and 
establishing new varieties. 
Many Good Old Varieties. 
I believe that there are more good varieties in existence at this 
moment than any one is aware of. It might be as great a service to 
disseminate and test these as to produce more new varieties. Many of 
these are no doubt old varieties, but which, for one reason or another, 
have not become known as their merits deserve. How to bring the ex¬ 
isting varieties, whether new or old, into the full recognition of their 
merits, is one of the most perplexing questions with which the plants- 
man has to deal. Experience has proved that more advertising will 
not accomplish it. There must be some large means of co-operative 
investigation. 
As one suggestion looking toward the solution of this diffi 
culty, Professor Bailey gave an account of the V olunteer 
Orchard” movement that was started in New York this last 
spring. To the request for trees, the nurseryman responded 
with good liberality and good will, as, indeed, he expected 
they would. Only a few plantations were actually made, how¬ 
ever, as it was desired to begin the work on a very small base 
and let it grow naturally, if there is any growth in it. 
Recapitulation. 
In conclusion Professor Bailey said : 
The upshot of all this speech is, therefore, this : (1). “Varieties,” 
as we now think of them, may not be finalities. We may come to the 
time when sub-varieties or strains of varieties are the things to be 
coveted ; in fact, this time has already come for some horticulturists 
(with the truck-gardeners, for example) who want “market gardener’s 
private stock” and other kinds of sub-strains. (2). We are to give 
increasing attention to the great fact that plants, as well as persons, 
have individuality, and that we must exercise care and judgment in 
choosing the plants from which we take layers, cuttings, buds and 
cions. (3). That the merit of a variety does not inhere solely in itself, 
but is in part the creatiom 
of the conditions under 
which it continues to be 
grown. (4). That we have 
no sufficient means for the 
establishing and proving 
of varieties, in order to 
determine the real merits 
and the real limitations of 
them ; that the practice of 
the “introducing” of “nov¬ 
elties” is only a present 
custom, maintained as a 
matter of trade, and that 
in the long run more care¬ 
ful and conservative meth¬ 
ods must obtain. 
George A. Sweet— 
“ All nurserymen are 
interested in the prac¬ 
tical side of this sub¬ 
ject. In the case of a 
Crawford orchard the 
practical nurseryman 
must select buds from 
a bearing tree to get the 
best strain of that va¬ 
riety. We go to Mr. 
Hale and ask for such 
buds. We get them. 
Next year must we go 
to Hale for more buds or can we take buds from the tree 
we have grown ? If so, where is the limit ? Are all going to 
breed true to name?” 
Prof. Bailey—“Upon that hinges the feasibility of the whole 
scheme. I confess I cannot answer the questions. I he pro¬ 
fessor comes with a more or less theoretical plan. W e may in 
time work it out practically. It is best to go back every ten 
years to the original tree. One reason why the Crawford is 
running out is because we are propagating from so main 
strains. We are thinning out our dairy herds by the applica¬ 
tion of the Babcock test. I wish we could apply a Babcock 
test to our orchards.” 
J. H. Hale—“ Many of you have read of the law suit 
against a member of this Association on account of a sale of 
Gravenstein apples. I have been in the orchard in question 
and have seen the trees that came from Massachusetts, New 
Secretary Seager. Vice-Prest. Weber. 
President Hale. Treasurer Yates. 
OFFICERS OF AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF NURSERYMEN. 
[Photograph by Prof. W. G. Johnson, of American Agriculturist and published by courtesy of 
Orange Judd Co., New York] 
