8 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



PUBLIC MEETING OF THE BOARD 



AT HINGHAM. 



The country meeting of the Board for 1878 was held at 

 Agricultural Hall, in Hingham, Dec. 3, 4, and 5. The 

 Chairman of the Committee of Arrangements, Edmund 

 Heesey, Esq., of Hingham, representing the Hingham So- 

 ciety on the Board, called the meeting to order at ten o'clock 

 on Tuesday, Dec. 3, and read the following address : — 



Members of the Massachusetts Boaud of Agri- 

 CULTUEE, — As chairman of the committee of arrangements 

 for this meeting, and as delegate of the Board for this sec- 

 tion of Plymouth County, it becomes my duty to call this 

 fifteenth annual public meeting of the Board to order ; and 

 as presiding officer of the Hingham Agricultural and Horti- 

 cultural Society, in whose hall you are now assembled, it 

 becomes my very pleasant duty to extend to you, and those 

 who have come with you, a cordial welcome. 



In welcoming you to this ancient county, I welcome you to 

 that portion of New England where the republican form of 

 o-overnment was first founded, where the rulers were first 

 elected by the votes of all classes, and where was first 

 founded our religious institutions and our free public schools. 

 I also welcome you to a people in whose veins flows the 

 blood of the Pilgrims. 



Plymouth County occupies a position so prominent in the 

 pages of history, that the landing of the Pilgrims, their hard- 

 ships, their misfortunes, their determined and persistent 

 efforts, their high integrity and final triumph, are all familiar 

 to every reader of the English language. It is therefore 

 unnecessary for me to enter into details relating to that little 

 band who landed on Plymouth Rock, and whose descendants 

 are now scattered throughout the length and breadth of the 

 American Union. 



I need hardly remind you that those principles which the 

 Pilgrims taught are those higher principles whicli have been 

 handed down to their descendants, and are to-day assisting 

 in lifting up and improving the religious, the moral, the 

 social and political condition of the people. 



