242 MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



evils that sometimes come out of good. It is an abuse of a commendable 

 trait — an injudicious exercise of a hospitable and generous temper characteris- 

 tic of the people of that section. Now, where an opulent farmer chooses 

 to buy and make an out-and-out present of a costly animal to a Society or a 

 neighborhood, that 's very well — as the French say, une autre chose. We 

 would like to be among the first and the loudest in applause of such munificence 

 on the part of those who can afibrd it. Heartily do we wish we could see a little 

 more of it ; but observation has shown that where a man gets choice animals, 

 cattle, or sheep, or hogs, and then lets any mean or miserly neighbor have the fre« 

 use of them, exchanging evenly, for instance his choice Leicester or South-Down 

 Jambs for common ones, those who thus get easily into the blood, set very little 

 store to it. Like woman's love, what is lightly got is lightly valued ; and thus 

 the race soon degenerates, and steady, progressive improvement, which should 

 be the object of all, is sacrificed to gratify a mean spirit on the one side, and good 

 nature, and too often a low spirited thirst for vulgar popularity on the other. 



It is not by cheapening anything really excellent of its kind that melioration 

 is secured. It has not been by such a system of making good things common, 

 that the progress of improvement has been kept up in England Avithout abate- 

 ment for the last hundred years. It was not under the influence of any such 

 slip-shod, careless, mistaken system of liberality that, in August last, Jonas Webb, 

 the great South-Down breeder in England, had at his annual letting of rams 

 some " 250 noblemen, gentlemen and agriculturists," on which occasion one ram 

 was hired for the season at $250 ; and the first sixty, let hy the season to the 

 highest bidders, at an average of $80. 



But to return to Cattle Shows as compared to Farmers' Clubs. The former 

 are highly useful in the lights and for the objects we have mentioned. £ut 

 they are far more liable to abuse and perversion than Clubs for discussio?i ; and 

 when intrigue and management supervene, and the people begin to see that 

 " kissing goes by favor," ill blood and disgust soon take the place of patriotic ex- 

 ertion and honorable and generous rivalry. There is, however, no human insti- 

 tution or enterprise that is not obnoxious to some objection or abuse ; and all we 

 can do is to endeavor to eschew the evil, and to keep the right constantly in view. 



Of one thing we respectfully think we may hazard a word of suggestion: that 

 agricultural papers, especially, would best promote the valuable objects of these 

 exhibitions by a severe, though just and impartial criticism, rather than by in- 

 discriminate praise of everything that is exhibited, of every thing that is said, 

 and every thing that is done ! Especially should they reprobate all low, mer- 

 cenary, underhanded attempts to bias the minds of judges for aAvarding premi- 

 ums ; and yet more the parceling out of premiums, here and there, on objects 

 devoid of any extraordinary excellence, scattering the funds of the Association 

 as so many seeds from which to gather a rotten harvest of ill-grounded and ephe- 

 meral popularity. We have known, for example, resolutions of thanks to be 

 passed complimenting a Mayor and the citizens of a town for their hospitality, 

 when at that very meeting, a wealthy and hospitable Member of Congress com- 

 ing from a great distance, President of an Agricultural Society at home, and in- 

 troduced as such, sat up all the first night after his arrival, by the tavern fire ; and 

 the next night was forced to leave at 9 o'clock for want of a bed. And at another 

 town, mors recently, hotel charges were enhanced, for the occasion, practicing 

 on strangers from foreign territories and distant States the most shameful rapa- 

 city. So we repeat, that praise, to be useful, should not be indiscriminate. 



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