278 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



greatly outnumber producers, and the home market, wliieli 

 demands all the products of the soil at highly remunerative 

 prices, encourages the farmers to exertions to meet the call. 

 As a consquence, the lucrative business of market gardening is 

 largely engaged in. Of roots and esculent vegetables, this 

 county, according to the statistics of 1855, raises more than all 

 the other counties of the State, and it is entitled to the appella- 

 tion of the garden of Massachusetts. 



In closing this report, I wish to call the attention of the Board 

 to a transaction that occurred on the grounds of tliis society, 

 near the closing hours of its last exhibition. An intoxicated 

 Irishman, in a fit of drunken frenzy, with a dangerous weapon 

 stabbed two men severely, and, as was feared at the time, fatally. 

 For this occurrence theK)fficers or members of the society were 

 not culpable. General good order prevailed, and the offenders 

 in this brawl were promptly arrested. It is a question whether 

 our societies are sufficiently guarded and empowered by legis- 

 lation, to protect themselves from scenes of a similar character. 

 We desire these annual exhibitions to be holidays to the entire 

 community ; but good order, sobriety, and decorum should be 

 the law of conduct. We wish our families, our wives and 

 children to attend them ; and it is imperative that they should 

 not be made thereby the witnesses of scenes that shock the 

 finer sensibilities, or be brought in contact with any thing con- 

 taminating to purity and morality. At such large gatherings 

 the refuse of society are prone to congregate, with no laudable 

 object in view, and the officers of the societies should have legal 

 powers to prevent all drunkenness and debauchery, wantonness 

 or rioting, on or about their exhibition grounds. If the laws 

 are already sutTicicnt, they should be enforced with promptness 

 and energy ; if not, we should forthwith seek the enactment of 

 such as will accomplish the desired end. 



Levi Stockbiudge. 



