It has been the custom of Mr. Wilder to present an address at each opening of the American Pomological Society. These have always possessed a degree of excellence; but the last is the best of them all, and we make room for it with much pleasure. It is eminently suggestive. We invite the reader's attention particularly to those parts relating to meteorological influences, the thinning of fruit, and the production of seedlings. They all present deep food for thought.

Gentlemen of the American Pomological Society: - Once more a kind Providence permits us to assemble for consultation, and the friendly interchange of experience in the ennobling and delightful art to which our Society is devoted. Once more I rejoice in the privilege of taking by the hand, so many of the distinguished cultivators of our land, with whom I have enjoyed sweet intercourse for a long period of time, and from whom I have received so many tokens of confidence and regard, during the twelve years of official service in this chair.

In behalf of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, at whose invitation we are here assembled, I extend to each of you a cordial welcome to this place, to our hearts and our homes. You come from different, and in some instances, from distant sections of our country, and some from lands better adapted for the cultivation of many kinds of fruit than ours. But true to our own instinct, and to the spirit of our venerable fathers, the founders of New England Pomology, we have brought up specimens of the progress which has been attained by us in this region. The first seeds of our fruits were planted by the colonists of Massachusetts Bay, in the year 1629. Soon after, the Colonial Legislature granted to John Winthrop, then Governor of the Colony, a section of land, on condition that he should plant thereon a vineyard and orchard, which grant received its name from his official position, and has ever since been known as Governor's Island, in the harbor of Boston. About the same time, Governor Endicott, of Salem, planted the first pear trees in that place, one of which is still living and bears his name. Precisely what the intermediate progress may have been we are unable to state.

But after a space of a century and a half, we find in the Boston Gazette of March, 1770, the following advertisement of the gardener of the immortal John Hancock, the first signer of that memorable instrument, the Declaration of Independence:

"To be sold by George Spriggs, Gardener to John Hancock, Esq., a Large Assortment of English Fruit-Trees, grafted and innoculated of the best and richest kind of Cherry Trees, Pear Trees, Plum Trees, Peach-Trees, Apricots, Nectarines, Quinces, Lime Trees, Apple Trees, grafted and ungrafted, and sundry Mulberry Trees, which will be fit to transplant the next Year, and Medleys.

To these worthy men, and others of more recent date, whose labors inspired our fellow citizens, may be traced the interest which, in the year 1829, originated the Massachusetts Horticultural Society; and, through the agency of this first Association, introduced into this section the results attained by Van Mons, Knight, and other European pomologists. Thus was here laid the foundation, upon which the science we seek to promote has advanced to a rank not inferior to that attained in any other country in the world.