304 [Senate 



this department, therefore, a wide field for improvement lies open. 

 The necessity is urgent, and the means ample. Let then the farmers 

 of this fertile county awake in this respect to their own interest, and 

 set themselves at once and in earnest about the work of providing for 

 themselves and the objects of their charge, an abundance of these table 

 luxuries. Let them remember Eden, and they will no longer regard 

 the employment of horticulture as below the dignity of the "tiller 

 of the soil." Let them but remember its fruits, and its bowers of 

 domestic felicity, and they cannot long remain insensible to the loss 

 they are now deriving to themselves and their families, in point of 

 health, physical enjoyment and domestic happiness, from this, their 

 own miserly neglect; nor can they, as we think, any longer forbear 

 to elevate the science and practice of horticulture to her proper stand- 

 ing in the scale of agricultural pursuits. 



We hope the Society will take some further measures with special 

 reference the promotion of this desirable object. 



REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON CROPS. 



After enumerating the list of successful competitors, and the pre- 

 miums severally awarded, the committee go on to say: 



" Gideon Rugar raised from 22 rods of ground 138 bushels of Ruta- 

 baga — the largest yield, but too small a quantity of ground to draw 

 the premium. 



" Charles C. Knapen raised 26 i bushels of Barley on 76 rods of 

 ground, nearly 60 bushels to the acre. But there is no premium on 

 barley. 



" Samuel H. Knapen raised 104 i bushels Potatoes on 39 rods of 

 ground. The largest yield, but too small a quantity of ground to be 

 entitled to the premium. 



" The committee would add that the statements presented by the 

 competitors, relating to the expense and mode of cultivation, and the 

 value of the crops, were, with one or two exceptions, deficient in 

 many respects." 



The fact alluded to by the committee in the last paragraph, is to 

 be sincerely regretted. It is indeed a fact which is not likely to be 

 too well understood, that by this same means the object of the Socie- 

 ty in offering those premiums, has to considerable extent been defeat- 

 ed. The object of the State in making the " appropriation," and the 

 design of this Society in seconding that object and attempting to car- 

 ry it out, was not to confer private advantages on a few, but to effect 

 an improvement in the state of agriculture generally. When, there- 

 fore, an appeal is made to the ambition or the emulation of enterpris- 

 ing individuals, by offering premiums on farms, crops, &c., it is for 

 the purpose of eliciting facts by which others may be convinced of the 

 possibility and the practicability of improvement, and of the high ad- 

 vantages it might afford. It is, in short, to show that some improve- 

 ments may be made — what they are — and how to he performed. 



But very few, however, of the statements rendered, have fully an- 

 swered this design. Still it is satisfactory to observe, that brief as 



