ANNALS. 



BY LEVI STOCK BRIDGE 



As an important change lias been made this year in the manner 

 of conducting our operations, it is essential that a concise statement 

 be made, showing what that change has been, the reasons therefor, 

 and the results. 



For several years after our organization, we were dependent on 

 private individuals or the town of Amherst for grounds and halls, 

 for our annual exhibitions. In process of time, as neither the town 

 nor private individuals could provide a hall for our use, its officers 

 were necessitated to build a hall unauthorized by a vote of the Soci- 

 ety, and which has been the only public hall in Amherst from that 

 time to this. At the annual meeting in 1859, the Society was in- 

 formed that the grounds on which we had held our show had been 

 granted to another association, and would not be again opened for 

 our use. There had been, for several years, a constantly growing 

 conviction in the minds of a large number of the active members of 

 the Society, that it should own grounds on which to hold its annual 

 exhibitions, in order to increase our income, and render them pleas- 

 ant and profitable. Nearly all the agricultural societies of the 

 State had grounds, and were prosperous and successful in promoting 

 the objects for which they were organized, while our Society, 

 although it secured the services of intelligent, active men for its offi- 

 cers, was from year to year running behind in its hold on the sympa- 

 thies and interests of the farming community, and in pecuniary 

 ability. Not only was all the income of the permanent fund ex- 

 pended in the current expenses, or working machinery of the Soci- 

 ety, but a large portion of the State bounty was consumed in the 



