STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 209 



sources in 1876 (including appropriation by the State), were $52,044 75, 

 and disbursements $50,591 38, showing a gain to the treasury of 

 $1,452 87. The fair of 1876 was generally well sustained, though the 

 cattle show was not so full as in several previous years, on account of 

 dissatisfaction among some of the cattle breeders, arising from want 

 of accommodations and alleged lack of attention on the part of the 

 Board. 

 In their report to the Society the Board remark: 



The work entrusted to us has been given thorough attention, and has been accomplished very 

 satisfactorily: and the wisdom of establishing and maintaining the Society as a central organ- 

 ization in a community engaged in testing and develojDing the peculiar, vast, and singularly 

 varied resources of a country remarkable in all respects, and absolutely requiring intelligent 

 and original observation and study to secure the best results of husbandry in all its branches, 

 has received new and forcible illustration. 



The annual address was delivered by Hon. Jo Hamilton. He dis- 

 cussed many questions and subjects of interest, and in closing referred 

 to the foothills of the State as follows: 



I cannot close these brief and disconnected remarks, Mr. President and gentlemen, without 

 alluding to one part of our State too long neglected, and a part of the State from every associa- 

 tion dearer to me than any other. Amid its hills 1 have lived for nearly twenty years. Of its 

 pure water I have been refreshed. In me its healthy air, its splendid climate, made a healthy, 

 heairt}' man of a confirmed invalid. Beneath its bosom lie buried some dear to me in life and 

 mourned and remembered in death. I refer to the foothills of California,, the grandest and 

 finest country in the world. Other parts of our State have had their poets and orators, who 

 have made them memorable in their orations and songs; but as yet no poet has arisen to do 

 justice to the foothills ol California in his songs. * -■■" * With markets at every man's door, 

 railroad transit in easy reach, with a climate unsurpassed, with the snow-clad Sierras behind 

 them, with the plains at their feet; Italy, with its sunny skies, its picturesque landscapes, 

 presents nothing to surpass it. The lands are cheap, and invite settlement and itnmigration. 

 Homes for millions now lie silent and awaiting occupation and habitation, The time will 

 come — and I ihink it ought to come speedily — when the foothill range of California shall be 

 one vast garden of villages devoted to fruit and vine culture, to the dairy and to the bee and 

 orchard business; when stretching along this whole range shall be one continuous orchard 

 and vineyard: when the smoke of tens of thousands of vine-clad cottages, filled with a happy, 

 prosperous and intelligent peasantry, shall inake glad the whole land ; when the school bell 

 each morning shall ring its matin call to a million of bright children growing up amidst its 

 plenty, enjoying its health, its wealth and its prosperity; when its numerous houses of wor- 

 ship, which shall raise their tall steeples to heaven, shall resound with the sound of music and 

 gladness throughout the land ; when the tired-out denizens of our cities shall seek those rural 

 homes as places of recreation and refreshment; when it may be truly said, "Here is a land 

 flowing with milk and honey, and here indeed is a people worshiping God under its own vine 

 and fig tree." 



The twenty-fourth annual meeting of the Society was held January 

 25th, 1877. There was a President and six Directors to elect, and a 

 great deal of interest was exhibited in the election. These vacancies 

 had occurred by resignation and otherwise. At this election Marion 

 Biggs of Butte was elected President, and Wm. P. Coleman of Sacra- 

 mento, L. U. Shippee of San Joaquin, and W. Dana Perkins of Placer, 

 were elected for the full term of three years; E. C. Singleterry of 

 Santa Clara, and Mike Bryte of Sacramento, to fill vacancies for 

 two years; and G. A. Johnson of San Diego, to fill vacancy for one 

 year. Efforts were at once commenced to heal up the disafFection 

 among the cattle breeders towards the Society, so as to secure a full 

 exhibition of cattle and the hearty cooperation on the part of their 

 owners. But as the main cause of this disafFection was the location 

 of the cattle stalls in the farther side of the grounds from the main 

 entrance, and the lack of a good and unobstructed road and walk to 

 the same, and as the Society was not in condition to make desired and 

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