FOR PROMOTING AGRICULTURE 159 



$5,000 to aid the new department of the university. 

 Some conditions were attached, which circumstances 

 made it difficult to carry into effect, and after negotia- 

 tion and a comparison of views, the sum of $2,000 was 

 granted, unconditionally, payable "whenever an ar- 

 rangement satisfactory to the college has been made 

 for an establishment." 



In February, 1885, a contagious disease having 

 appeared, known as "hog-cholera" or "swine-fever," 

 a committee of trustees was appointed to call the 

 official attention of the Executive of the State to the 

 situation. Governor Ames responded in a special 

 message to the Legislature, and an act was promptly 

 passed to provide authority and means to exterminate 

 the disease. The act was general and covered any 

 contagious disease which existed, or might appear, 

 among domestic animals, and provided a penalty for a 

 wilful suppression or withholding of information of 

 the presence of such diseases. 



In 1887 a premium of $1,000 was awarded and paid 

 to J. D. W. French, of North Andover, for a plantation 

 of larch trees, raised by him, in conformity with the 

 terms of the society's premium offers of 1876. The 

 official report of the matter says that the trees were 

 European larches, about 15,000 in number; as origi- 

 nally planted. They were set to cover an area of five 

 acres, about four feet apart, excepting along the 

 boundaries of the field, where they were placed nearer 

 together. The land was a steep slope, facing to the 

 south, covered with a thin coating of gravelly loam, 

 mixed, towards the bottom of the hill, with light sand. 

 It was of no value for tillage, but had been used for 

 pasturage, though of little worth for that, having but 

 the scantiest growth of native sedges and grasses. 

 During the ten years some of the trees died, so that 



