332 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



Again we find this society in 1800 framing and publish- 

 ing a set of inquiries addressed to the farmers and culti- 

 vators of the State, requesting information on almost every 

 interesting subject of agriculture. The corresponding sec- 

 retary of the society, referring to this matter, said : — 



Doubtless the principal object of the gentlemen, who then 

 composed the Board of Agriculture, in sending forth these 

 queries, was to enable them to make a correct analysis of the 

 actual progress and state of agricultural science in Massachu- 

 setts; to ascertain its defects as well as its advantages; to com- 

 pare the processes and crops of one part of the Commonwealth, 

 with those of another; and to contrast the whole with the pro- 

 ceedings and products of other countries.^ 



The following is from an "Historical Address" by Hon. 

 Charles G. Davis, at the Massachusetts Agricultural College, 

 Amherst, June 21, 1887 : — 



It was in 1807 that a new era in the progress of agricultural 

 education dawned in New England, which, at first little noticed, 

 was destined to mark an eventful change and to hasten the 

 progress to an agricultural development. Up to this time, so 

 far as can be learned, no agricultural society had thought of 

 a "cattle show" with premiums to be awarded in public, but 

 the societies had confined themselves to printed publications, 

 and to awards for essays and field crops and for the importa- 

 tion of the best sheep. In the autumn of 1807 Mr. Elkanah 

 Watson . . . procured the first pair of merino sheep which 

 had been introduced into Berkshire, and perhaps the whole 

 Commonwealth. . . . Mr. "Watson gave notice of an exhibition 

 of his two sheep on the public square in Pittsfield. ... On 

 the 1st of August, 1810, an appeal drawn by Mr. Watson and 

 signed by twenty-six persons appointed an exhibition of stock 

 on the 1st of October. This effort was successful, and resulted 

 in a charter of the Berkshire Agricultural Society the ensuing 

 winter of 1811. 



A marked expression of this need of education in agricul- 

 ture is found in "An Address to the Essex Agricultural 



^ The Massachusetts Agricultural Repository and Journal, Vol. IV., 1816, 

 p. 281. 



