the most valuable tree we have, and it is the most valuable wood grown
in the North. I don't believe, either, the black walnut will ever be
less valuable than it is. I know positively that the Stabler tree is not
over sixty-five years old, perhaps, not over sixty, and yet that tree,
judging from the prices I have seen paid for other trees of similar
size, is worth from $125 to $150 on the stump. From the time that tree
started until now, it has increased in value at the rate of two dollars
a year, for timber alone, to say nothing of the nut. Suppose the tree
had been purchased sixty years ago at two dollars from the nurseryman.
It would have paid one hundred per cent annually on the investment. It
bears, as a regular thing, a crop every other year.

As to what Mr. Pomeroy said about the black walnut not cracking well and
crumbling up when it gets to be old, I have some specimens here of the
Stabler walnut I cracked this morning, which are of the 1915 crop.

The kernel of these old nuts keeps its flavor and sweetness wonderfully.
There is hardly any change in quality within one year, whereas some
other nuts, as the hazel and some varieties of the pecan, become rancid
after keeping six months.

DR. MORRIS: I would like to say one word about the curly walnut. In
Maine, not long ago, I saw a young man who had bought a bird's eye
maple, perhaps fifty years of age, that he paid $1,500 for. I asked him
why he didn't graft one million ordinary maples from that tree and sell
the stock at $200 per tree, and then he would have $200,000,000 at just
about the time of life when he could enjoy it. Well, that hadn't
occurred to him. Now, if Mr. Littlepage will hunt up this curly black
walnut stump that sold for $3,500, and if he will graft a million trees
from that he will be able to raise a family of ten children (Laughter.)

DR. STABLER: Mr. President, I just want to call attention to an omission
in the little talk that my son gave about the characteristics of this
Stabler tree, namely, its beauty as a shade tree. He didn't mention
that, and I don't think any one has mentioned it in connection with the
black walnut. Now, the black walnut trees, as we meet them along the
roadsides, vary exceedingly in habit of growth. The majority of them
have very few main limbs, perhaps not over half a dozen main limbs on a
tree, and they will be gaunt, ungainly things, stretched out straight,
like great arms reaching out with very little beauty.