dependence upon other States for so large a proportion of our fruit supplies.

Among the apples that have proven valuable in our State are the following:

Summer-Early Harvest, Early Strawberry, Primate, Summer Queen, All Summer, Red Astracban, Dutchess of Oldenburg, Sweet Bough, Summer Sweet Paradise.

Autumn-Porter, Maiden's Blush, Summer Rambo, Fall Pippin, Jeffries, Garvenstein.

Early winter-Smokehouse, Rambo, Falawater, Pittsburgh Pippin. Winter-Smith's Cider, York Imperial, Newtown Pippin, York Stripe, Peck's Pleasant, Ewalt, Rome Beauty, Domine, Romanite, Yellow Bellflower, Winter Sweet Paradise, Talman's Sweet, Lady's Sweet.

Northern winter apples that have proven of value, but in eastern Pennsylvania are simply fall and early winter apples, are the following: Baldwin, Rhode Island Greening, Hubbardston, Northern Spy, Esopus Spitzenberg, Roxbury Russet, Twenty Ounce, King, besides other standard varieties in more northern latitudes. These popular northern apples, have, however, proven equally valuable in the north-western counties of our State as good keepers. In the mountain districts they are also good winter apples, while some of the most popular kinds in eastern Pennsylvania are being rejected in the higher altitudes. They are many other valuable varieties that might be recommended, but it is a general mistake to plant too many kinds in one orchard, unless for the purpose of testing.

The many excellent new varieties of grapes foreshadow a fresh impetus toward the extension of this desirable fruit. No kind of fruit will produce a large yield, with such certainty, as the vines can be laid down during the winter and be protected against any degree of cold. The pruning and training has been so much mystified as to deter many from attempting its culture, which, however, is just as simple as that of any other fruit. The Concord still continues to be the grape for the million, while Ives, Martha, Iona, Delaware, Telegraph, with some of the newer varieties, are successfully grown in the different sections of the State.

Small fruits should not be neglected by any family that has a square rod of ground to plant, but especially the strawberry, as it is so delicious as to gratify the taste of the most fastidious, while it is so productive and certain of a crop in almost any season, that it seems almost criminal to reject it on the part of heads of many families, whose juniors almost famish for the want of such palatable and health-producing food in its season. Wilson's Albany is still extensively grown, but is fast giving away to Charles Downing and other varieties of better quality.

On motion the discussion of this essay was postponed until after the reading of the two next essays on the list, viz:

FRUIT-HOW BEST SECURED AND PRESERVED.

By Prof. D. WILSON, Member from Juniata.

The importance and value of the fruit crop, estimated at $140,000,000, is equal to nearly one half of the wheat crop. As an article of food for man and beast, it is pleasant to the taste, and both nourishing and healthful to the body. Being not merely a luxury, but an actual necessity to

the human race. By a beneficent arrangement of Divine Providence, it is made to grow in almost every latitude and in great variety of form and taste; and while some kinds last for a considerable time, many are transient, and soon pass into decay. It becomes then an interesting question how we may best secure it for our use. How we may preserve it in its natural state for a much longer period of time than that which nature has assigned to it? We shall say nothing about the various methods of preserving the small fruits, and large ones, too, by the long used process of preserving them by steeping them in boiling syrup made of sugar. However delicious to the taste fruits thus treated may be, it is manifested that this method is too expensive ever to come into general use, except as an occasional luxury to be indulged in only by the well to do. Nor need we say much about the ordinary process of canning fruits. It is true that this has now become one of the valuable industries of the country. Fruits of all kinds and of all seasons and climates, all the vegetables used as human food, and even fresh meats are successfully canned. In the fruit season thousands of people are engaged, and hundreds of thousands of capital are invested in this business. Increasing every year as it is in magnitude and importance, and yet neither by sugar preserving nor by canning are we able to retain in its freshness and perfection the natural flavor of the fruits. By what means, then, can we retain this flavor? Without noticing any of the abortive failures that have hitherto disappointed fruit growers in their efforts to keep fruits fresh and flavory for months after their proper season has passed, we shall attempt to indicate some of the conditions by which this may, to a considerable entent, be accomplished; and shall confine our remarks mainly to the larger fruits, and shall use the apple for illustration.

1. One of the first requisites in securing and preserving fruit success fully is, care in picking. They may not be beaten down with poles; they may not be shaken down from the limbs by strong arms; but they must be picked, carefully picked, one by one, with the hand, and all the better, too, if the stem remains attached to the fruit. They must receive no bruise from the limbs of the tree, nor from the ground, nor from one another. They must be laid carefully in vessels having no sharp edges, so as to avoid bruising them while conveying them to the place of storing; and, in general, from the time they are plucked from the tree until they are delivered into the hands of the consumer, they must be handled as carefully as you would handle a basket of eggs. This careful handling is altogether indispensable.

2. They must be carefully assorted and classified. Not only must the different varieties be kept each by itself, but the early should be kept separate from the late, the juicy from the dry, the hard from the soft, the wellformed from the ill-formed, &c., &c. The bruised, the knotty, the specked, the worm-eaten, should be rigidly excluded from the good, and devoted to immediate use, either for cooking, canning, or drying.

After they have been thus carefully picked and assorted, how will you keep them, fresh and flavory, from autumn to harvest? This is just the question which we all would rejoice to be able to answer correctly. In order that a sound, ripe apple or pear may be kept for a long time in its natural state, four things are absolutely necessary: 1. It must be kept in a dry atmosphere. 2. Light, as a general thing, must be excluded. 3. It must be kept at a regular temperature, and that, at about 40° Fahrenheit. And, 4, it must be so placed as to be capable of being observed.

1. As to the dryness of the atmosphere. If in addition to the natural moisture constantly exuding from the fruit, by evaporation, it is surrounded

with air laden with moisture arising from a damp cellar or cave, the tendency to decay must inevitably be hastened. This is the general experience of those attempting to keep apples in damp cellars, or caves, or buried in the earth.

2. As to light. It is not because light in itself exercises any special deleterious chemical influence on the fruit, as because, mostly, when you admit light, you admit a change of temperature. I suppose light might be admitted through glass without much injury.

3. As to the regular temperature of about 40°. If you allow the temperature to fall to 32°, or lower, your fruit will freeze; and if you permit it to rise much above 40°, the degree of heat will produce rapid rotting.

4. There must also be some convenient arrangement made to enable you to observe how your store of fruit is keeping, as from time to time you observe it.

How can the fruit man secure all these conditions in a way that is both convenient and economical? Long ago people kept even very perishable fruit by storing it away in common ice-houses. This has given way to fruit rooms, constructed much like above ground ice-houses. They may be built of any material suitable for an ice-house, with double or triple walls, doors, &c. The inside is furnished with shelves, or sometimes with drawers, and the fruit is carefully laid on these shelves, not more than three layers thick to a shelf. If there are three board walls and the interior space between the two outer walls is filled with pulverized charcoal or dry sawdust, and the house kept closed, or opened for airing only on moderate days, the fruit will not freeze even in the depth of winter, and in the summer it can be ventilated whenever there is a drying wind. The shelves or drawers should be about three feet above the floor. The most successful experiment of which I ever heard, of keeping apples for more than a year, was by an English gentleman who kept them in a very dry cellar about three feet above the ground. He had shelves, made of a convenient length and breadth, upon which he placed a layer of apples, and then covered them with dry sand, upon this first layer he placed a second and third, covering each layer with sand to absorb the moisture escaping from the apple, and to exclude the moisture, light, and heat in the atmosphere. He kept his apples sound, fresh, and well flavored until late in the following autumn. The experience of the French in managing pears, and of those who raise and ship oranges, lemons, limes, grapes, &c., demonstrates that there must be fine paper, cotton, fine charcoal, dry sand, ground plaster, (dry,) or sawdust, surrounding the fruit to absorb the moisture or it will not keep. Many have succeeded tolerably well in keeping fruit in dry cellars or in dry gravelly caves, but these cellars or caves naturally possessed in a measure, the conditions of the cool dry atmosphere.

The fruit room, on a small scale, might be possessed by every farmer having a moderate quantity of fruit to store away.

But in the vicinity of a large town, or in a populous community in which much fruit is grown, we think a large fruit-house might be maintained with all the necessary appliances of apartments, shelves, heat, ice, &c., at a moderate charge for those who might choose to store their valuable fruits in it. It would be simpler than a cheese factory or butter factory.

One very common mistake made in keeping apples, is that of keeping them in very large piles. It is obvious that this method must hasten decay. One thing is sure, that the value of the apple crop even to the ordinary family, makes it worth the while of everybody, and particularly of this Board, to investigate this subject thoroughly, and to give the result of these

investigations to the public. And it is to be hoped that now and here some additional and reliable knowledge will be obtained upon this subject by a familiar and interlocutory discussion of it.

FRUIT-WHEN, WHERE, AND HOW TO MARKET.

By D. H. FORESMAN, Member from Lycoming.

In the allotment of questions for consideration at this meeting, the advisory committee could scarcely have selected one upon which I feel less posted, or with which I have less practical experience. Therefore, what I have to say will partake more of the nature of theory than practice, more of how it should be done than of how it is done.

When to Market.

If you have anything like a good market, the proper time to market fruit is when it is ripe, for no crop loses more by keeping. Even the most successful grower will tell you that the losses from decay are so great that it requires a very large increase in price to warrant holding the the product. Many kinds must needs be marketed as soon as ripe. Of course, my remarks refer to apples and pears as that class which may be preserved.

If, however, the grower decides to hold his crop for higher prices, he must use judgment as to the kinds which he keeps, for some kinds will decay so rapidly as to destroy all chance of profit from a possible advance in price.

If to the market value in the fall, we add the expense of handling, storage, and interest upon their value, to the loss by decay and shrinkage, we will usually find the margin on the wrong side, and that we cannot compete with the New England fruit grower, who, either from the effect of soil, climate, or some other cause, can produce a better keeping fruit than we can. In answer, then, to the first portion of my subject, I would say, market as soon as the fruit is in proper order, and before it is so ripe as to render handling difficult.

Where to Market.

If you have a reasonably good market near at home in which you can sell without paying freight and commission, it is, in nine cases out of ten, the best one for you. Freight and commissions swallow up the margin for profit more in the fruit trade than in any other. Thousands of bushels of peaches are sent out of Delaware orchards which hardly pay freight and commissions, and often do not pay for these charges. The best market for the grower on a moderate scale is that of his nearest town, in which he can sell from his wagon without any other expense than his time. In this market he either obtains all the profit there is, or else avoids a large proportion of the loss. In the agricultural papers we often read of large sums having been realized by fruit culture, but such cases are always to be found in the neighborhood of towns and cities furnishing a good ready market,. so that the producer saves freight, commission, and time. I do not take the ground that a distant market may not prove profitable, but I do think 6 AGRICULTURE.

that the chances are against it, and in favor of lower prices nearer home and sales for cash.

How to Market.

Always market in the best possible condition, and pick close. It will not pay to market inferior fruit with good, with the expectation that the good will sell the poor-it will not do it, and if the two are marketed together, the whole will often not bring as much money as the good would have done if marketed alone. Many cases have been given of pears in the hands of city commission merchants having been picked over and one third left out as inferior, and still the re-assorted fruit brought higher prices than the whole would have done. If you pack for a distant market, do not place the best fruit in the ends of the barrels, under the impression that you will thereby deceive the purchaser. This has become so common that the buyer always makes sufficient allowance for it, or will refuse to to buy unless the whole contents are exposed to view. A dealer, who by fair dealing and packing, establishes his credit in the market, even if he cannot sell for a higher price, (in which he seldom fails,) can, at least, find more ready sale at all times, and especially when the market is dull. Even when selling from the wagon, in a "home market," it will pay to cull close. If you choose, you may take the best of the culls along in your wagon, and sell them at a lower price, but it will often pay as well to leave them at home, and especially so if the market is well supplied and dull. In a good brisk market you can, of course, find a market for inferior fruit, but if not culled out, it in all cases hurts the sale of the good in a greater proportion than it increases the measure. In my market (Williamsport) carefully handled, closely culled, and sound fruit will always sell easiest, and brings the best price, and in a dull market find the most ready sale, and so it is the world over.

Mr. MORRIS. I saw Mr. Eby, of Harrisburg, have some nice apples of 1876. How he kept them in that way, I do not know. A description would be of interest.

Mr. J. R. EBY, of Harrisburg. I have but a few words to say on the subject; and it is more to explain, than anything else, that it was by accident that these apples were kept. They were not wrapped; but kept in a cellar of probably forty degrees. They were laid in there, and they have kept better than those in wrappings. I was surprised to find them in the condition they were, when I came to take them out. They were taken out last October; picked a year before, and some fifteen in number. Mr. Morris, I believe, examined them, and found them to be in good condition. Mr. MUMMA. Of what variety are they?

Mr. EBY. There is one variety I do not know. I gave one to Mr. Engle to name. One was an ordinary winter pippin.

Mr. KELLER. Where they kept in a damp or moist place?

Mr. EBY. They were kept in a very nice, dry tub.

Mr. KELLER, of Schuylkill. I used to keep my apples in a cool, dry cellar; but they would not remain satisfactory. After a time, they would shrink, and, as a natural consequence, decay. I changed then to a cellar where it was cool and damp all the time; and the same apples which would rot in the dry cellar would keep for a month to a month and a half in the damp place. I was surprised that the apples would keep plump and full, where otherwise they would decay. A great many who have written on the subject, have held the theory that the place of keeping should be dry, but my experience has been the reverse.