The Secretary here read extracts from the preface and introduction to Fuller's book on nut culture, prepared by Col. C. K. Sober, with personal interpellations, as follows: * * * * * I believe that the moment is opportune for advocating an effort to cultivate all kinds of edible and otherwise useful nut-bearing trees and shrubs adapted to the soil and climate of the United States, thereby inaugurating a great, permanent and far-reaching industry. We are spending millions for imported articles of everyday use which might easily and with large profit be produced at home, and in many instances the most humiliating part of the transaction is that we send our money to people who do not purchase any of our productions and almost ignore us in commercial matters. I am not referring to products ill-adapted to our climate, nor to those which, owing to scarcity and high price of labor, we are unable to produce profitably, but to such nuts as the walnut, hickory, butternut, pecan and chestnut which we can raise as readily as peaches, apples and pears. There certainly can be no excuse for the neglect of such nut trees on the score of cost of labor in propagation and planting, because our streets and highways are lined and shaded with equally expensive kinds, although they are absolutely worthless for any other purpose than shade or shelter, yielding nothing in the way of food for either man or beast. Can any one invent a reasonable excuse for planting miles and miles of roadside trees of such kinds as elm, maple, ash, willow, cottonwood and many other similar kinds, where shellbark hickory, walnut, butternut, pecan and chestnut would thrive just as well, cost no more, and yet yield bushels of delicious and highly prized nuts, and this annually or in alternate years, continuing, and increasing in productiveness for one, two or more centuries. The nut trees which grow to a large size are just as well adapted for planting along roadsides, in the open country, as other kinds that yield nothing in the way of food for either man or beast. They are also fully as beautiful in form and foliage, and in many instances far superior to the kinds often selected for such purposes. The only objection I have heard of as being urged against planting fruit and nut trees along the highway is that they tempt boys and girls as well as persons of larger growth to become trespassers. I find this only applies to where there is such a scarcity that the quantity taken perceptibly lessens the total crop. But where there is an abundance either the temptation to trespass disappears or I fail to recognize the loss. As we cannot very well dispense with the small boy and his sister I am in favor of providing them bountifully with all the good things that climate and circumstance will afford.