10 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Resolved, That we pledge ourselves, so far as circumstances may 

 permit, to conduct an experiment the present year, in the culture 

 of the potato, using fish guano as a manure, in accordance with 

 such suggestions as may be furnished by the Committee of the 

 Board. 



Resolved, That a general invitation is hereby extended to farm- 

 ers to join us in the experiment, with the request that results be 

 returned to the Secretary of this Board. 



Mr. Chamberlain presented the following Report on 



Flax Culture, 



The Committee appointed at the last meeting of the Board, to 

 investigate the subject of Flax Husbandry, have attended to the 

 duty assigned, to the extent of their limited opportunities, and 

 Report : 



That it gives them great pleasure to find that this topic, of vital 

 national importance, has received merited attention at the hands 

 of the Government, and that a competent gentleman has been sent 

 to Europe to investigate the cultivation and manufacture of flax ; 

 and that the facts thus elicited, together, with the present home 

 status of this interest, are assigned a prominent place in the 

 Agricultural Report of the Commissioner of Patents for 1861. It 

 might seem that this investigation, conducted with all the means 

 at the command of the Government, would have suflSciently venti- 

 lated the subject, without an additional effort on the part of hum- 

 ble individuals laboring for the greatest good of a single State. 



It appears from the report above named, that but little remains 

 to be done, when, by the aid of machinery, flax may be expedi- 

 tiously treated in its several mechanical and chemical manipula- 

 tions, and converted to ultimate uses. 



In pursuance of our mission, one of your Committee, during the 

 year took occasion to visit the State of Rhode Island, where we 

 had in some way received the impression that the greatest success 

 had been attained in the manufacture of flax fabrics. Our journey, 

 (a very hurried one,) accomplished nothing further than to put us 

 in communcation with a " Committee appointed by the Rhode 

 Island Society for the encouragement of Domestic Industry," to 

 investigate the subject of Flax culture and its preparation and use 

 in. connection with cotton and otherwise. 



A member of that Committee, (Hon. James Y. Smith,) com- 

 municates to us the result of a meeting holden at Providence, Oc- 



