FOR PROMOTING AGRICULTURE 93 



such exhibitions. And it cannot be doubted that, in 

 instances, the instruction thus conveyed was promo- 

 tive of agriculture in those far countries. 



The pubhc exercises in the meeting house were 

 always opened with prayer, usually, if not invariably, 

 by the Brighton pastor. The annual address in most 

 instances dealt with such problems and demands of 

 the agricultural art, as the stage of development 

 reached at the particular time, might suggest. But 

 much variety of treatment was possible, and so it 

 happens that a part of the credit justly due to the 

 Massachusetts society is for contributions made, 

 through its orators, to the literature of eloquence. 

 Three specimens, one in aim and effectiveness, but 

 diverse as, perhaps, is possible in style, will illustrate 

 this phase of the society's experience, and permit the 

 reader to decide, if he can, which is the excellent 

 orator, or, so to speak, where should be awarded the 

 "premium." 



In 1822 the address was delivered by Timothy 

 Pickering. In one of the society's publications it was 

 referred to in these terms; "Col. Pickering's address 

 is said to have been too practical to suit the ladies, 

 who had come in great numbers to hear him. It 

 savored less of the flowers than of the compost from 

 which they spring." The recorder confessedly ob- 

 tained his information at second hand. Compost was, 

 indeed, one of the topics. There is no mention of 

 flowers, even of allusion. Nor did the orator indulge 

 in so much as a flower of rhetoric throughout his long 

 discourse, and varied from an inexorable plainness 

 only in one slight touch of facetiousness. But of the 

 chrystalline possibilities of English speech one might 

 search far for a better example. He began as follows: 



