xlvi Annual General Meeting, JJecemher 11, 1912. 



agricultural community. No words were necessary to commend the proposal 

 to the Members, and as his Lordship, with his well-known modesty, could not 

 very well put the resolution to them himself, he, Mr. Courthope, asked them to 

 express their approval. 



The resolution was passed by acclamation. 



Lord MiDDLETON, in reply, thanked the meeting for their vote. He 

 considered it last year, when he was elected, a great honour to have been 

 appointed to represent that great Society a second time. They would remem- 

 ber that the first time he occupied the Presidential Chair he had not had a very 

 successful time of it. That was in the year 1904-5, and they would remember 

 the troubles tliey were in, and the difficulties they had to get over. Time had 

 put things right, and now lie thought the Society was in a very prosperous state. 

 He could not say that it was owing to him, but others who came after him at 

 that time did an enormous amount for the Society then, and year by year the 

 state of the Society had improved. He could assure them that he had enjoyed 

 his year of Presidency. At that time last year he hoped, and he had every 

 reason to expect, that the Show at Doncaster would have been one of record 

 years. They all knew what happened, but they could not prevent that. 

 They could not prevent the weather, but he had been glad during the past year 

 to add his small endeavours to keep the Society in the state in which it had 

 been going on for some years. There was one thing he would have liked to see, 

 and that was a larger acce-sion of Members to the Society. He noticed they 

 had an increase by one since that time last year, and he could have hoped they 

 could have taken a lesson from their friends in Norfolk and added considerably 

 more to the membership for the year. He trusted that next year, when they 

 were going into a different part of the country, that still more Members might 

 be induced to join. 



The meeting then terminated. 



