CHAPTER X 



The Royal Agricultural Society The Shorthorn Boom John 

 Thornton The Bath and West Society A Kindly Send-off. 



IN 1870 the Koyal Agricultural Society of 

 England held its annual show at Oxford, 

 under the presidency of the then Duke of 

 Devonshire, and the Oxfordshire Agricultural 

 Society suspended its show for that year, in order 

 to devote its energies in support of the national 

 Society ; it also made a liberal monetary grant 

 from its funds towards the prize list of the visiting 

 Society. It was at Oxford in 1839 that the Eoyal 

 Society started on its career of usefulness, under 

 the title of the English Agricultural Society, with 

 Earl Spencer, its founder, as its first president. 

 My father, who actively interested himself in the 

 inauguratory show, gave me many particulars of 

 it which testify to the remarkable progress made 

 by the Society since then. In 1839, a field of six 

 acres was sufficient for all it had to accommodate, 

 which comprised 350 entries of stock and 23 of 

 implements, and two days covered the duration 

 of the gathering. Its members were 1800 in 

 number and the amount offered in prizes was 

 750. The Society is too well known for a 

 comparative statement showing how it has pro- 

 gressed since then to be necessary, but few 



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