156 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



The Cleveland Bays are perhaps the best breed for New Eng- 

 land use. They are lighter in form and carriage than the Clydes- 

 dale and serve almost as well for the team as for the road. They 

 are of the class of the old English carriage horses, and easily 

 converted to any other nse. 



The introduction of mowing machines, and other new agricul- 

 tural implements to be worked by horses, makes attention to 

 this subject of daily increasing importance to the agriculturist, 

 both as a breeder and as a worker of horses. 



The Hampden County Agricultural Society has been the first 

 to take the field in horse shows with a view to the improvement 

 of the breed, and as it should do, will retain the pre-eminence. 

 The grounds at Springfield are admirably adapted to such 

 displays, and with each successive year improvements will 

 doubtless be made, suggested by experience. 



Your committee, in view of these circumstances, would ven- 

 ture to suggest that this general object, the improvement of the 

 breeds of horses, can be best attained by continuing and syste- 

 matizing an annual horse fair or market, to be held at a fixed 

 time and place, — for example at Springfield, — whither ease of 

 access by all the railways in the country, the beautiful grounds 

 with convenient appurtenances, and the spirit and enterprise 

 and open-handed liberality of its citizens, all invite. 



Such a market instead of being held once in every year might 

 perhaps successfully commence with holding one semi-annually, 

 say on a given day in May and in October, and we feel assured 

 that our friends at Springfield, when it became a " fixed fact," 

 would see a greater attendance than was brought together at 

 the late show, both of men and animals. The attendance 

 would be more gratifying likewise, because it would be the 

 natural, wholesome coming together of people engaged in an 

 important branch of agricultural industry, which the magnitude 

 of the transactions and exchanges effected upon the occasion 

 would alone serve to measure. 



This market would be a school which is very much needed in 

 this country. It requires but little wit to know which horse 

 wins a race, if one stands at the winning post, or which animal 

 draws the heaviest weight, after looking at the tests; but it does 

 require sagacity and great experience to select the best horse for 

 any given purpose from a number which may be presented. 



