ESSEX AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 11 



a package of seed for every member of the Society who 

 desired it. He recommended the culture of Swedish tur- 

 nips as well. 



In his address to the Society in 1820 he called atten- 

 tion to the great crop of carrots raised by Erastus Ware 

 in 1817 on the Pickman farm in Salem, 752 bushels, 

 weighing 18% tons, on one acre ; commented on the flat 

 culture of corn as preferable to hilling; remarked upon 

 the Arbuthnot iron plough, and quoted at length from 

 the foremost English authorities on farming. The se- 

 ries of publications thus begun has been continued, with 

 a few interruptions, to the present day, and constitutes 

 probably the largest and most helpful contribution to 

 the literature of agriculture made by any County Society 

 in the Commonwealth, and perhaps in the country. 



The second method adopted by the Society was the 

 Cattle Show, already popular in other localities. Its first 

 venture in this field was at Topsfield, the most central 

 point in the County in the days of stage travel, on October 

 5th, 1820. Dr. Andrew Nichols of Danvers, physician 

 and skilled farmer, made a noteworthy address, in which 

 he made keen disclosures of the shortcomings of the 

 average farmer, his error in attempting to cultivate too 

 many acres, his deplorable neglect of the garden and 

 orchard, and with prophetic foresight declared that the 

 best interests of the County would be promoted by the 

 establishment of an Agricultural Academy. It i^ an 

 interesting coincidence, that when the day came, nearly 

 a century later, and an Essex County Agricultural School 

 was opened, it was near neighbor to Dr. Nichols's farm. 

 His closing appeal to the Society, "to prevent our annual 

 cattle show from becoming scenes of riots, drunkenness, 

 gambling, cheating and dissipation," is a suggestive pic- 

 ture of the typical Cattle Show then in vogue. 



In the published Transactions there were included, 

 beside the Address, the Reports of Committees on 

 Working Oxen and Neat Cattle, on Fat Oxen and Swine, 



