228 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



to bestow au equivalent to that bounty. The section reads as 

 follows : 



" Section 5. Every society shall annually, on or before the tenth day of December, 

 make a full return of its doings, signed by its president and secretary, to the secretary 

 of the board of agriculture, embracing a statement of the expenditure of all money, 

 specifying the nature of the encouragement proposed by the society, the objects for 

 which its premiums have been oflfered, and the persons to whom they have been awarded, 

 and including all reports of committees and all statements of experiments and cultiva- 

 tion regarded by the president and secretary as worthy of publication; and shall accom- 

 pany the game with such general observations concerning the state of agriculture and inanufac- 

 tures in the State as it may deem important and useful. The return, whether in printed or 

 manuscript form, shall be marked in such manner that those passages in the several reports and 

 statements deemed by such officers most worthy of public notice, study and application, may be 

 easily distinguished." 



It is difficult to conceive a more excellent arrangement than is 

 contained in the portions of these acts which I have quoted. An 

 appeal is made to an educated and industrious community of farm- 

 ers to become at once teachers and learners. Had Arthur Young 

 enjoyed the privileges which have been bestowed upon the Board 

 of Agriculture and its Secretary in Massachusetts, the agriculture 

 of England might have been advanced a century through his 

 instrumentality alone. Every experiment, however small, every 

 essay however humble, every investigator however rude and primi- 

 tive his processes, receive direct encoui'agement from the State, 

 and find listeners and learners in every farmhouse, where may also 

 be found the experimenters and writers of the art. 



The history of the Board and of the societies in Massachusetts, 

 and this is true also of Maine, shows that their work has thus far 

 been well done. If there was ever any doubt of the disposition 

 and ability of the farmers of Maine or Massachusetts to acquire 

 and impart information, that doubt should be removed by the 

 series of volumes entitled the Agriculture of those States. Turn 

 to the "Abstract of the Returns of the Agricultural Societies of 

 Massachusetts," contained in those pages, and you will find a 

 record of facts, figures, opinions, theories and laws upon almost 

 every matter of interest to the farmer, a record drawn from the 

 soil itself by the well-educated cultivator, or from the stalls and 

 folds and pens of the successful managers of the domestic animals 

 used upon our farms. Page after page presents to your consideration 

 the refined sentiments, and generous speculations, and encourag- 

 ing thoughts, not only of educated men who are called to address 

 our societies at their annual exhibitions, but of those also, wlio, 

 / as practical farmers, ennoble their calling and add their daily 



