22 LINCOLN COUNTY SOCIETY. 



LINCOLN COUNTY AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



The Fifteenth Annual Show and Fair of this Society was holden 

 at Waldoboro, on the 19th, 20th and 21st days of October, 1869. 

 The show was as successful as the officers anticipated — this So- 

 ciety laboring as it does under depressions, arising from a number 

 of causes. 



The show of horses and colts was but indifferent, there not 

 being what might be called a really fine specimen among them ; 

 this in Lincoln county, that a few years since was noted for the 

 fine horses she produced, should not be, while other portions of 

 the State are taking more interest and expending large amounts 

 for the improvement of the noblest of the brute creation, we have 

 sadly degenerated, and hope before another show that some im- 

 provement in this department will be shown. 



The show of stock was meagre and the quality not as good as 

 at some of our former exhibitions, but this is to be expected in a 

 locality where the shipping of hay is made a specialty. It will 

 eventually end in poorer farms, poorer cattle, smaller crops and a 

 depopulated State, unless some special means are used to keep the 

 sod up to its virgin productiveness. It is a well known fact that a 

 large portion of our farms where they have been in the habit of 

 selling their hay for successive years instead of raising stock, have 

 become so run out they have neither hay or stock to sell, and the 

 farms and their owners have been growing poorer year by year. 

 The true policy of every farmer should be to consume the hay or 

 a large portion of it on his own farm, sell his stock, thus making 

 manure to enrich his land, making it more productive, also more 

 valuable ycarl}'. The grass crop in this section of the State 

 suffered severely from its being so dry in the early part of the 

 season, there being in Lincoln county not more than two-thirds 

 of a crop. ^ 



The show of field crops was larger than usual ; there were fine 

 specimens of wheat, rye, corn, oats, beans and peas, but not one 

 sample of barley on exhibition, the reason for this I cannot ac- 

 count for when there was so generous a crop of this grain raised 

 in this locality the present season. There was shipped from this 



