118 THE MASSACHUSETTS SOCIETY 



the early experiences of the trustees in publication, 

 and the difficulty, then found, in obtaining original 

 contributions. He expressed opinion that the Journal 

 had had an educative influence in arousing the curi- 

 osity and exciting the intellectual powers of the agri- 

 cultural population, and recognized, in the existing 

 circumstances, cause for congratulation. "At the 

 present moment," he said, "three or four agricultural 

 newspapers are fully supplied with original matter, 

 and, what is most encouraging, far the greater mass of 

 articles are from the pens of real cultivators." These 

 ten volumes have an average of about 400 pages. The 

 collection as a whole is a testimonial of the diligence 

 and zeal of a service to the public, in the doing of 

 which no applause was expected and but little was 

 bestowed, and wherein the pecuniary outgo was much 

 and the income small; and it is also a memorial or 

 record of permanent value, as relating to the agricul- 

 tural progress of the period which it covers. In thus 

 finally referring to it, two matters may be noticed 

 which did not seem to be pertinent at any point in the 

 text as hitherto written, and which have both an his- 

 torical and an intrinsic, that is to say, readable, 

 interest. 



The first throws light upon the relative progress in 

 invention, in the line of agricultural utility, in this 

 country and in England, and is contained in a com- 

 munication from Col. Timothy Pickering, published in 

 the Journal in 1820. The subject was the compara- 

 tive value of the labor of oxen and of horses, in farm- 

 ing operations. The writer expressed preference for 

 the former, and, while recognizing the fact that horses 

 were generally preferred in England, quoted a remark 

 contained in a then recent discussion of the subject by 

 Sir John Sinclair, president of the British Board of 



