quality of soil. It has been required, iu the ploughing 

 match to-day, to plough seven inches ; but that, in most soils, 

 is too shallow. When it is recollected that the roots of many 

 grasses descend as deep as eight or nine inches in search 

 of food, and that the roots of many vegetables go as deep 

 as two or three feet and more, it will at once be seen that 

 the common depth of ploughing at the present time — though 

 we plough much deeper than was practiced fifteen or twenty 

 years since — is far' too shallow. If the soil is shallow and 

 poor, the more need of deep ploughing, and every time such 

 soil is ploughed the depth should be increased, inch by inch, 

 until the whole surface of the ground is thoroughly pulver- 

 ized, nine or ten inches from the surface; thus giving the 

 ground greater capacity to throw toward the surface the 

 salts that lie buried in its bosom, to mingle with the gases 

 of the atmosphere, and thus give the greatest possible amount 

 of food to the vegetable kingdom; and if we had but two 

 words to say to all tillers of the ground, they should be, 

 '■'•plough deep" and more abundant and rich will be the 

 crops that mother earth shall give in return for your labor. 

 Respectfully submitted by the Committee. 



JOSHUA T. EVERETT, Chairman. 



WORKING OXEN. 



Committee. — Ezra Kendall, Sterling, — Nathan Danforth, Princeton, — 

 Joel Hay-wood, Asliby, — Daniel Miles, Westminster, — James P. Putnam, 

 Fitehburg, 



Your Committee upon Working Oxen, have attended to 

 their duty, and Report. The whole number of entries of 

 oxen were ten, and your Committee have had a hard duty 

 to perform in endeavoring to do justice to the various com- 

 petitors. We have many things to take into consideration, 

 viz: age, weight, and training; and all tending to influence 

 the result in the accomplishment of the work. And while 

 we would say that all were good,, we must conclude which 



