% MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



ago rambled the black-looking, fine-woolled merinos of the 

 Spanish grandee, the Count of Montaco. 



These events led to the charter of incorporation of your 

 society the ensuing winter, and in the fall of 1811, just sixty 

 years ago, our fathers organized your society, and inaugurated 

 that series of " Cattle Shows and Fairs " which has distin- 

 guished your history and continued regularly and annually 

 from that day to the present. Your first fair o? 1811 was a 

 novelty and a success, and produced an impression which 

 remains vivid upon the memory of those now living who wit- 

 nessed it. 



EFFECT OF THE EXAMPLE. 



Your example had a wide influence upon the country, and 

 your peculiar model was referred to and imitated in many parts. 

 That suggestion of one of your old citizens, Ebenezer Center, 

 that a committee should annually visit and report upon the 

 growing crops, and which has continued to be one of the most 

 useful of your regulations, was unique and original. 



ENCOURAGEMENT TO MANUFACTURERS. 



In view of a war with Great Britain, which was foreseen, 

 and which broke out in 1812, the necessity of domestic man- 

 ufactures was at once realized. Therefore your society began 

 its career by offering the highest rewards for woad and madder 

 and woollen and linen cloth. At that time more or less of spin- 

 ning and weaving was done in every farm-house for supplies of 

 clothing, and wool and flax and woad and madder became 

 common productions. 



At your first exhibition of cloth, the distinguished and 

 patriotic first president of your society, Elkanah Watson, who 

 labored with great zeal through a long life in the cause of agri- 

 culture and internal improvements, announced to tho ladies 

 present, with much exultation, that the President of the United 

 States (then Mr. Madison) and the President frigate (the pride 

 of the American navy, afterwards unfortunate) were both 

 clothed from the woollen and duck looms of Pittsfield. With 

 such encouraging success, your society continued for many 

 years to offer the highest rewards to manufactures. I can 

 remember when merino bucks brought prices which you would 



