PUBLIC MEETING OF THE BOARD 



AT EASTHAMPTON. 



The Country Meeting of the Massachusetts Board of 

 Agriculture was held in the Town Hall at Easthampton, on 

 Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, Dec. 4, 5 and 6, 1888. 

 Hon. George B. Loring presided, and called the meeting 

 to order, after which the Rev. Mr. Colton offered prayer. 

 The Rev. Dr. S. T. Seelye of Easthampton then delivered 

 the opening address, as follows : — 



OPENING ADDRESS. 



BT 8. T. SEELYE, D.D., OP EASTHAMPTON. 



Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the State Board of Agriculture. 



The pleasant duty has been assigned me of extending to 

 you a most cordial welcome, in behalf of the Hampshire, 

 Franklin and Hampden Agricultural Society, the Farmers' 

 Club, and the citizens of Easthampton. We are glad to see 

 you. We deem it no small honor to be visited by this 

 Board of representative men, who have made the great in- 

 terests of agriculture the study and the business of their 

 lives. We highly appreciate the opportunity thus afforded 

 us of adding to our scanty stores by sharing the rich 

 treasures which you have gathered by years of careful in- 

 vestigation and unremitting toil. We shall listen with 

 earnest attention to your words of wisdom, and we are sure 

 that our mental horizon will be broadened and our aspira- 

 tions will be uplifted by your coming. But the rich bless- 

 ing which you are to give us compels us to ask. What can 

 we do for 3''ou? We would not only receive, — we would 

 also give. Yet, in the things where you are so rich, we are 

 poor indeed. We could only repay you in copper, where 



