SEYEIN^TEENTH ANNUAL REPOET 



SECRETARY 



BOAED OF AGRICULTURE. 



To the Senate and House of Representatives of the Common- 

 wealth of Massachusetts. 



The past year furnishes a striking illustration of the depend- 

 ence of the farmer upon the vicissitudes of the season. A 

 spring of more than usual moisture started vegetation into 

 a vigorous and rapid growth, very favorable to the hay and 

 other early crops. The barns were well stored, and had it not 

 been for the gales of September which visited some sections of 

 the State with disastrous violence, and the floods of October, 

 more general in their destruction, it would have been a year of 

 imusual prosperity. Still, notwithstanding these drawbacks, 

 the general record of the year is one upon which we may dwell 

 with satisfaction. 



The most serious obstacle with which the New England far- 

 mer has to contend is the want of free and open markets, open- 

 ing a more direct trade between the producer and the consumer. 

 The prices which the consumer has to pay for farm products are 

 high enough, perhaps, but they do not find their way into the 

 farmer's pocket. As a general rule, probably less than fifty per 

 cent, of what an article of farm produce costs the consumer in 

 the retail market reaches the hands of the farmer who produced 



