MIDDLESEX SOCIETY. 49 



height, five feet broad at the foundation, and from three to four 

 feet at the top. The improvement already made, and still in 

 progress by Mr. Howe, excited the Committee's admiration. It 

 is composed, in a great measure, of large masses of rock, 

 removed from their native beds by immense labor, and not with- 

 out the aid of gunpowder. One piece of wall, thirty or forty 

 rods in length, presents an upper surface of flat stones, on which 

 the committee walked with as much ease and rapidity as they 

 could on the surface of the ground, — ay, and with much greater 

 facility than one can travel across some of the fields in our 

 county, which the owners appear to think easy of cultivation. 

 It afforded really a pleasant promenade. But its beauty is per- 

 haps the quality for which it should be least admired. Its 

 strength, usefulness and durability, are its valuable characteris- 

 tics. Such a wall may laugh in the face of Old Boreas, defy the 

 attempts of frost to heave its foundation, and stand the tolerable 

 shaking of a New-England earthquake without tottering. 



There is one other feature in the system of improvement, to 

 which the committee refer with pleasure and approbation, viz., 

 the construction of barns, with cellars for the making of ma- 

 nure. A descriptive detail of all that the committee observed 

 during the week occupied in their examination would consume 

 more time than they have at their disposal ; but they cannot 

 omit the opportunity now presented to impress upon the minds 

 of all their brethren the importance of saving all the ingredi- 

 ents that enter into the composition of that substance which 

 renovates exhausted soil, and restores to the earth the nutritious 

 particles which have been extracted from it by successive crops, 

 — enabling Nature to reinvest herself in her emerald attire, and to 

 present to her votaries her annual tribute of ambrosial flowers 

 and golden fruits. The philosopher and the naturalist — and 

 the farmer should be both — may take pleasure in contemplating 

 the benign process by which ingredients, the most ofiensive 

 to the human senses, are converted into articles that gratify the 

 most delicate taste and pamper the most luxurious appetite. 



In awarding the Society's premiums, the committee have 

 endeavored to fulfil the supposed intentions of the Society; and 

 it gives them pleasure to add, that, in no single instance, was 

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