30 



intellectual labor which has been bestowed fur the honor 

 of this Society and for instruction in the Art of Agri- 

 culture. Page after page of our Transactions is filled 

 with short reports of Committees, concise statements 

 upon crops and cattle, and manures, and processes of 

 cultivation, and grass, and fruit trees, containing hints 

 and facts by which the farmer may 1)e guided in his 

 business. But not only for the information which it 

 contains, is this long record of fifty years of agricultural 

 thought, valuable and interesting — but for its signifi- 

 cance as the product of an intelligent, inquiring and ed- 

 ucated community. A prize animal in the stall, pre- 

 mium crops on the acres, indicate a skillful devotion to 

 agriculture which all practical men respect. A thought- 

 ful essay upon this animal or crop indicates an intellect- 

 ual ambition which we all admire. It tells of schools 

 and books, and studious hours, and diffusion of knowl- 

 edge, and social respectability, and civil elevation, and 

 all the moral advancement which attend upon popular 

 freedom, and the institutions of an enlightened people. 

 It tells of prosperous and progressive agriculture. 



Of the practical operations of this Society, of the 

 premiums it has awarded, the plans of improvement it 

 has designed, there is a long and honorable record, which 

 I should be glad to lay before you in all its details ; but 

 I must content myself with some of its most promi- 

 nent features. 



The encouragement of well-managed farms was one of 

 the early objects of the Society ; and I am sorry to say 

 it is an object which has met with indifferent support 

 from our farmers. For many suscessive years there 

 have been no entries in this class ; and a vast amount of 

 information has been lost from the unwillingness of farm- 



