Exports of oil cake, $6,284,364. Cotton seed, $147,543. We are sending
too much of this excellent food to other countries. ‘To retain and feed it
would add to our meat product, and we lose also the manure product, which
feeding it would greatly increase. Clover, timothy, garden, and all other
seeds exported, $915,223, so that, not including flax, our exports are more
than our imports. ‘Through the courtesy of Prof. Tracy I have a letter from
the firm of D. M. Ferry & Uo., the largest seed dealers in the world, and also
have a note from Mr. Peter Henderson, a prominent vegetable gardener,
florist, and seed dealer in New York. Prof. Tracy writes:

**TIn reply to yours, we would say that there are certain seeds, notably cab-
bage, which give a much greater yield abroad than with us, so that from this
cause combined with cheap labor, they can be afforded there at much lower
rates than they can be grown for here. In the case of some varieties of cab-
bage and turnips the foreign seed is inferior in quality to that of American
growth, so much so that in the trade they are quoted at different prices, and
the foreign seed is never used,—or at least we do not use it,—largely except in
ease of u failure of the American crop, and then with the uuderstanding that


154 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY.
