THE ROYAL DUBLIN SOCIETY 223 



districts, and in connection with it was a factory for 

 the sale of implements of husbandry. This society 

 was brought out more or less under General Vallancey's 

 auspices, and from the time of its formation the Dublin 

 Society ceased to give encouragement to agriculture in 

 the way that it had formerly done, and the prize system 

 was more or less abandoned. The Farming Society 

 lasted not quite thirty years, disappearing in 1828, when 

 the Dublin Society resumed its labours in that branch. 

 In the Proceedings, vol. xxxvi., will be found a pro- 

 spectus of premiums offered by the new society, the 

 secretary of which was Charles Mills. Under it, a 

 show of neat cattle and sheep was held at Ballinasloe 

 in October 1800, and one at Smithfield, Dublin, in 

 November of the same year. Reports on these shows 

 appear in Proceedings, vol. xxxvii. On the yth of May 

 1 80 1, 200 were paid to this new body by the Dublin 

 Society. 



In 1818, the Committee of Botany recommended 

 to the Society the recently founded Horticultural 

 Society, and in 1822, a Farming Society for North 

 Kerry was founded at Listowel, which requested aid 

 from the Dublin Society. 



The Rev. Wm. Hickey, Bannow Glebe, Taghmon, 

 sent to the Society, in February 1823, an account of 

 an agricultural school which, in conjunction with Mr. 

 Boyse, he had established in his own parish. The 

 latter gave forty acres for experiments, and 700 were 

 laid out in starting the school. It accommodated 

 nineteen youths, and two masters instructed them in 

 the theory and practice of husbandry. Chemistry, 

 botany, and mechanics were also taught, and it was 

 hoped they might yet have a greenhouse and botanic 

 garden. In 1 824, Mr. Hickey and Mr. Boyse were pre- 

 sented with the Society's gold medal, in acknowledgment 



