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statesman, and the gentleman; and here too, Sir, at home among the farmers, 

 a deeply interested observer of all that was done and all that was shown, stood 

 one who towered above the intellects of the age, as Saul among the people — 

 one whose fame, centuries hence, will loom up on the page of American history, 

 like the great Pyramid of Cheops upon the plains of Egypt — sublime and 

 awful ! — here was Webster, the Farmer of Marshfield. But alas ! he is with 

 as — he is with the living — no more. Amid the scenes endeared to him by 

 the sweetest associations, among sleeping children and kindred, the aged patriot 

 rests, and the surges of the sounding sea sing his requiem. And here were 

 hundreds, thousands of the men and women of Norfolk, inspired by a noble zeal 

 in a noble cause. 



Your Society knew no infancy. Like Adam, it came forth created of the full 

 «ize and stature of a man. Men saw it as the river, but never as the brook ; 

 they saw it as the oak, but never as the acorn. 



Your next annual meeting. Sir, was another mighty gathering. The timid 

 and the envious had prophesied exhaustion from the first effort ; " the wish was 

 father to the thought" in many cases, and they foreboded a failure. There 

 were false prophets in those days, Sir. The second show was, in all essentials, 

 % great improvement upon its predecessor ; and the Norfolk Society was no 

 longer, even by the most hesitating, called an experiment ; it was a " fixed fact." 



Among your guests on the occasion of your second anniversary, was one of 

 the oldest laborers in the field of agricultural literature, JouN S. Skinnek, of 

 Baltimore. In 1819, he commenced the publication of the American Farmer, 

 — the first agricultural paper published in America ; — and on the 2d of April, 

 before he had secured a single subscriber, appeared the first number. The 

 iubscription price was $4 per annum. He conducted this journal for several 

 years, with profit to himself and to his country, and afterwards sold it for 

 ^20,000. He afterwards established the Turf Register, which was also success- 

 ful. He then became editor of the Farmer's Library and Agricultural Journal, 

 j)ublished by Greeley and McElrath, of New York ; and finally started and 

 edited The Plough, the Loom, and the Anvil. He also held various honorable 

 offices under the general government: having been appointed a PiH-scr in the 

 Navy, by his friend. President Madison, and afterwards Postmaster of Baltimore. 

 This position he held under changing administrations for a period of twenty-two 

 years. He was also appointed Assistant Postmaster General by General Harrison. 



Mr. President, he too has gone to his reward ! He is beyond the reach of 

 our praise or our sympathy ; but I cannot believe the time and place unfitting 

 for this passing mention of his name. 



Men of mark have died among us and about us. Sir, but the young havw 

 «tcpped forward to fill the gap left by the departure of their elders; you and 

 others have been spared to us, and the Society has continued up to this day to 

 flourish. 



But, Mr. President, the spirit that called into existence the Norfolk Society, 

 and conducted it in its career, was not lulled to slumber by success. The same 

 spirit, the same men originated the Massachusetts Boaud of Aguicul- 

 riJRE, so ably represented here to-dav by its Secretary. This organization, 



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