POULTRY. 245 



their ancestral homesteads, wliere they have dove-cotes, and 

 rabbit-warrens, and poultry-yards and gardens. Trained as 

 choristers, they chant in the village church, and are encouraged 

 to engage in out-of-door amusements, those precious links of 

 domestic life. In those cottage homes grow English vigor, like 

 English oak, to branch far and wide, yet have a sound heart. 

 Young men are contented at home — they till the soil their fath- 

 ers tilled, and endeavor to transmit it in their turn to their first 

 born sons, in better condition than it was when they received 

 it. Crowded out by a surplus population, a younger son may 

 engage in commerce, or follow the fortunes of the red-cross 

 flag, but he ever hopes that the day will come when fortune 

 will permit him to become a British landholder. He wishes to 

 improve his native soil, in which his early aifections were deeply 

 planted, and he is ever ready to exclaim, — 



" Where'er I roam, whatever climes I see, 

 My heart, uiitravelled, still returns to thee." 



Your committee would respectfully suggest the propriety of 

 awarding premiums to lads, for poultry, gardens, vegetables 

 and animals, equal in amount to the sum distributed among 

 the girls for their ornamental handiwork. It matters not what 

 they may bring, if it add to the interest of the exhibition, and 

 plants in their youthful breasts a desire to become exhibitors. 

 When these boys become farmers in their turn, rest assured 

 that the one who was the fortunate competitor for a rabbit or 

 chicken premium, will win higher honors. "Just as the twig 

 is bent the tree 's inclined." 



Harrison Eaton, of Haverhill, was the only exhibitor who 

 complied with the desire of the society to have statements fur- 

 nished. He exhibited four hens, a part of a flock kept since 

 January last, and averaging sixteen — two of them cocks. They 

 were fed on corn, (with oyster shells always by them,) and con- 

 sumed twelve bushels, costing $14.13. Tliey had laid 1790 

 eggs, which had been sold at an average price of twenty-one 

 cents per dozen. The hens were of the old-fashioned "creep- 

 er" breed. 



In concluding this somewhat discursive report, your commit- 

 tee would hope that censure may be averted from their succes- 

 sors by a classification and definition of the gratuities to be 



