74 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan. 



under two years old, your committee would most respectfully recom- 

 mend a diploma, or a discretionary award in money, as the Board in 

 their wisdom may think best. 



Henry Johnson, of Millbury, also presented a pair of yearling 

 steers, weighing 2,060 lbs., well matched and broken to the yoke, 

 and your committee recommend a gratuity to him, as Dr. Loring and 

 Mr. Johnson are certainly entitled to the thanks of the Board for the 

 sacrifice they have made in bringing up for our inspection, and so 

 creditable to themselves, tAvo pairs of most superior steers. 



S. W. Buffum, of Winchester, N. H., offered for our inspection a 

 pair of 3 year olds, weighing 3,350 lbs., and a pair of yearlings weigh- 

 ing 1,800 lbs., remarkable for nothing more than their weight; yet 

 your committee would recommend a soiall gratuity on the three year 

 olds, but nothing on the yearlings. 



Last but not least, your committee was requested to take note of a 

 single 5 years old bull, belonging to Howard Ford, of Roxbury. 

 This bull was first tested in a horse-cart, with a load of about 

 4,000 lbs., and his owner performed more evolutions in drawing, 

 backing, and in hawing around and geeing around, and in going 

 straight forward, to say nothing of his snow-shoeing and riding on 

 the back, than any competitor on the ground. The most of your 

 committee still believe that premiums, even at this advanced stage of 

 the Fair, should be offered on working bulls, single, in harness or in 

 yoke, as best may suit the estate or convenience of the .competitor. 

 We know of no team so cheap as the bull. He can handle the cart, 

 provoke the soil with the plough or harrow, mow or rake with the 

 new and useful machines for that purpose, and still be all the surer as 

 a stock-getter of his kind. 



It is said in the early history of the Massachusetts, that a Mr. 

 Blackstone, for whom the town of that name was christened, " keped a 

 big bull, and besede the entire evolutions of the farm, rode him to mill 

 a distance of nearly a dozen miles to the head of NarowGansett Bay, 

 as well as to meeting on Sundays." Now Mr. Blackstone was a good 

 farmer, and left a name and substance that but few can do in these 

 later times ; and the image of this bull may at this day be seen 

 serving as a weather-vane, on a public building in that goodly town, 

 as a perpetual monument to his own and his master's worth. 



Leaving tl.e above suggestions on working bulls to the wisdom and 

 fidelity of the Massachussetts Board of Agriculture, your committee, 

 composed as they are from several of the counties of the State, and 

 being appointed especially to judge the stock in their department 



