274 NORFOLK SOCIETY. 



detailed statement of expenses and income, of the management 

 and product of their different crops, and of the general treat- 

 ment of their lands and their cattle ; and they further recom- 

 mend, that the committee on farms be hereafter requested to 

 take into consideration the means of the farmer, as well as the 

 length and breadth, the cultivation and improvement of the 

 farm. The applicants will become more numerous, lands be 

 better cultivated, and men who depend entirely upon their 

 heads and their hands — men who most deserve, if they do not 

 need, our encouragement — will come into direct and healthy 

 competition with richer cultivators; and all will sooner realize, 

 that agriculture is the "mother of the arts, the most honorable 

 and the most prolific of good to the world, to which all other 

 arts pay grateful homage, and with which science itself seeks 

 honorable association." 



The applicants for premiums are, Aaron D. Weld, of West 

 Roxbury, and Benjamin V. French, of Braintree. 



By the rules of the society, your committee were required to 

 make their examinations in the months of July and September. 

 The farm of Mr. Weld was examined on the 3d of July. This 

 *is an old, ancestral farm. The farm, containing about two 

 hundred and ten acres, has been, for many years, in a steady 

 and systematic course of improvement. What the father de- 

 signed and left unfinished, the son has completed. The present 

 proprietor commenced his farhiing operations in 1835. Since 

 that time he has accomplished much, each successive year fur- 

 nishing evidences of his zeal and skill, perseverance and suc- 

 cess. At the decease of his father, in 1835, there were many 

 cross walls dividing the farm into numerous lots. These walls, 

 in all, about one hundred and eighty rods, have been removed. 

 Most of the stone has been buried and covered deep in the 

 ditches of his reclaimed meadows. The balance has been re- 

 served for other use. He has laid about seven hundred rods of 

 lieavy stone wall, in addition to what his father had built. At 

 the entrances of the several lots he has gate posts of Quincy 

 granite, with substantial gates, all of which can be, and gen- 

 ^erally are, kept locked. 



Pruit trees are yearly added to the already extensive orchards, 



