226 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Dr. LoRiNG, of the Essex Society, said, as a member of the 

 committee which prepared the blanks to be used by the societies, 

 that the Board had tried to make the requirements as practi- 

 cable and as little burdensome as was consistent with the idea of 

 getting some value in return for the money which the State was 

 paying for the advancement of its agriculture. He proposed 

 some modifications in the blank which would meet any reason- 

 able objections which could be made to the present requirements. 



Mr. Taft, of the Worcester South-East Society, advocated the 

 amendments, and said, in reply to the assertion' of Mr. Perkins, 

 that farmers would often deceive the committee, and swear to 

 statements which were not true ; that, as a general rule, farmers 

 were an honest class of men, and that if cases of deception and 

 perjury had occurred in Berkshire, or any other county, the 

 individuals by whom it is practised should be forever after 

 debarred from competing for premiums. 



Messrs. Garfield, of the Housatonic Society, Grout, of the 

 Middlesex South, Lathrop, of Hadley, and Tidd, of the 

 "Worcester West Society participated in the debate, till it was 



Voted, to refer the subject to a committee consisting of Messrs. 

 Perkins and Garfield, to prepare such a schedule of require- 

 ments as should, in their judgment, facilitate the action of 

 societies, and at the same time secure the object of the State in 

 offering its bounties, by eliciting accurate, trustworthy and 

 exact information in regard to the crops entered for premium, 

 and to report the sariie for the consideration of the Board. 



This committee reported subsequently, but as the course 

 suggested was not thought to be calculated to secure the desired 

 end, it was not adopted. 



The question- then recurred on Dr. Boring's amendments to 

 the blank to be furnished by the societies to competitors for 

 premiums. 



Prof. Agassiz said there ought to be a more general under-, 

 standing as to the object of awarding premiums, that is, as to 

 whether they are designed simply to reward farmers for improve- 

 ments that may have been made, mere rewards of merit, in 

 other words, or to gather some facts and data of value to 

 agriculture. The latter ought to be the aim of the State, and 

 if it is, we cannot be too exacting and minute. 



