FOE PROMOTING AGRICULTURE, 135 



not being possible, as many were admitted by season 

 tickets. The figures, taking the four days into account, are 

 indicative of the increase of population and travelling facil- 

 ities in sixty years, when compared with the attendance of 

 4,000, which made a great day for Brighton ; and, consid- 

 ering that no admission fee was then asked, they prove, at 

 least, no diminution of popular interest in things agri- 

 cultural. 



The exhibition comprised : Neat cattle, 609 ; horses, 174 ; 

 sheep, 285 ; swine, 161 ; coops of poultry, 745 ; entries of 

 machines, implements, vegetables, fruits, dairy products, 

 etc., 4,404. It was unrestricted as to territory, and the ag- 

 riculture of each of the New England states, and New York 

 state, was represented. In 1888 the Bay State Society gave 

 an exhibition at Springfield, which was not guaranteed by the 

 Massachusetts Society, though $1,500 in premiums was 

 granted by the latter. In 1889 another exhibition, with guar- 

 anty, was given in the Huntington Avenue building, which 

 was substantially a repetition of that of 1886, and at which 

 the full sum of $2,500 was paid by the Massachusetts Soci 

 ety in premiums, the trustees of that Society being again 

 represented on the board of directors. 



In 1884 the trustees reprinted for gratuitous circulation 

 a small volume entitled " the legal rights and liabilities of 

 farmers." Its author was Edmund H. Bennett, LLD., dean 

 of the Boston University School of Law. In style it was 

 familiar and concise. It was generally appreciated by 

 those for whose reading it was intended, and the edition 

 was soon exhausted. In it the main points of common and 

 statute law were presented, as applicable to bargaining for a 

 farm, to farm boundaries, the hiring of help, rights in the 

 public road, rights of way over farm lands, railroad rights 

 of way, farm fences, impounding cattle, injuries to and by 

 farm animals, injuries by dogs, farmers' liabilities for the 

 acts of their hired men, fires in the fields and woods, drain- 

 age and flowage rights, trespassing, overhanging trees, 

 lightning-rod agents and peddlers of patents. 



In May, 1884, the trustees granted the sum of 300 in aid 



