284 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



without all the details necessary to make them well under- 

 stood, have had a serious effect on the competition for our 

 prizes. Would it not be well to make it a condition that cows 

 offered for premium shall in the trial months, say from May to 

 September, have no other feed than pasturage and green fod- 

 der ? Without such a general rule, it is to be feared that there 

 can be but little fair competition, and that many people will 

 decline it altogether for whose advantage it is especially pro- 

 posed. In this department, as well as others, careful readers 

 cannot fail to observe that amateur, and not practical, farmers 

 generally bear off the prizes, to the disappointment, and often 

 permanent disgust, of less-favored competitors. These gentle- 

 men amateurs would add greatly to the obligations they have 

 already laid the community under if they would enter their 

 fine stock for exhibition only, and leave the prizes to parties 

 to whom they are a pecuniary object as well as a proper ambi- 

 tion. 



The committee have observed with great pleasure the suc- 

 cessful efforts of many gentlemen in the county to introduce 

 the best foreign stock to their neighbors and the public. Al- 

 ready the effect is obvious to the observer when passing over 

 the county in any direction. Fine cattle of the Jersey, Ayr- 

 shire, Devon, and Durham breeds are often seen mingled with 

 the best native stock. Much of this improvement is also to be 

 attributed to the " Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agri- 

 culture," which has with well-conducted liberality placed bulls 

 of various breeds in different parts of the Commonwealth for 

 public use. 



James Brown, Chairman. 



MIDDLESEX SOUTH. 



Statement of Obcd Winter. 



The cow I offer for premium brought a fine heifer calf the 

 10th of March last, which took one-half her milk, and at five 

 weeks and three days old was sold for over eleven dollars for 

 veal. 



The first week in June she gave one hundred and twenty- 



