APPENDIX. 181 



premiums offered by the state board of agriculture or the Massa- 

 chusetts society for the promotion of agriculture to be awarded 

 within the incorporated county agricultural societies, but such pre- 

 miums shall be subject to the rules and regulations prescribed by 

 said board or the trustees of said Massachusetts society. 



Sect. 5. Every such society shall annually, on or before the 

 tenth day of December,* make a full return of its doings, signed by 

 its president and secretary, to the secretary of the board of agri- 

 culture, embracing a statement of the expenditure of all money, 

 specifying the nature of the encouragement proposed by the society, 

 the objects for which its premiums have been offered, and the per- 

 sons to whom they have been awarded, and including all reports of 

 committees and all statements of experiments and cultivation 

 regarded by the president and secretary as worthy of publication ; 

 and shall accompany the same with such general observations con- 

 cerning the state of agriculture and manufactures in the state as it 

 may deem important or useful. The returns, whether in printed or 

 manuscript form, shall be marked in such manner that those pas- 

 sages in the several reports and statements deemed by such officers 

 most worthy of public notice, study and application may be easily 

 distinguished. 



Sect. 6. A society which neglects in any year to comply with 

 the laws relating thereto, or with the regulations of the board of 

 agriculture, shall not be entitled to the bounty of the state the 

 year next succeeding. 



Sect. 7. Every society which receives said bounty shall offer 

 annually, by way of premiums, or shall otherwise apply for the 

 encouragement or improvement of agriculture or manufactures, a 

 sum not less than the amount so annually received, and shall offer 

 such premiums for agricultural experiments and in such manner as 

 the state board of agriculture requires. 



Sect. 8. Every such society shall annually offer such premiums 

 and encouragement for the raising and preserving of oaks and other 

 forest-trees, as to it seems proper and best adapted to perpetuate 

 within the state an adequate supply of ship-timber. 



Sect. 9. All money offered for premiums which is not awarded 

 or paid shall be put out at interest and added to the capital stock of 

 the society. 



Sect. 10. The foregoing provisions shall not extend to an agri- 

 cultural society incorporated for any territory less than a county, 

 except by special enactment for that purpose. 



Sect. 11. Incorporated agricultural societies may by their 

 officers define and fix bounds of sufficient extent for the erection of 

 * Tenth day of January now ; changed in 1874 by Act of Legislature. 



