34 EARLY SOCIETIES. 



presented, but the decision was delayed till an examination 

 could be made of their correctness, and the award of the 

 silver medal was in April following, made to Messrs 

 Foulis, printers in Glasgow, for an edition of the hymns of 

 Callimachus (Greek). The prize for planting the largest 

 number of timber trees was awarded to Mr Alexander 

 Baxter, farmer, Woodhead, Borrowstownness ; and the 

 second prize to Mr Alex. Walker, farmer at Auquhiry,* 

 Dunnottar, Kincardineshire. 



The Edinburgh Society, probably feeling that they 

 lacked the practical element in their monthly meetings, pub- 

 lished in the newspapers of March the i6th, 1756, an intima- 

 tion that ' all farmers who inclined to assist the Society in its 

 deliberations were desired to send a note of their names and 

 places of abode to Mr Alex. Tait, the Society's Secretary.' -f- 



The premiums offered by the Edinburgh Society for 

 competition in 1756 were greatly more numerous, and they 

 comprised a large number that had reference to agriculture. 

 A prize of ten guineas ' for the best invention in arts or 

 agriculture ' was given to Robert MacKail, millwright, 

 Dunipace, as inventor of a machine for cleaning wheat, 

 performed by two concentric cylinders. A gold medal was 



* 'Mr Walker, tenant of Auquhirj', a disciple of Mr Barclay's, is a 

 successful improver, and has made money.' — Wight's Husbandry, vol. ii., 1778. 



+ It may be interesting to note here some of the subjects discussed at the 

 monthly meetings of the Edinburgh Society : — 



What are the advantages to the public and State from grazing? What 

 from com lands ? and which ought to be most encouraged in this country ? 

 Whether great or small farms are most advantageous to the country ? What 

 are the most proper measures for a gentleman to promote industry on his own 

 estate ? What are the advantages and disadvantages of gentlemen of estates 

 being farmers ? What is the best and most proper duration of leases of land in 

 Scotland ? What proportion of the produce of land should be paid as rent to 

 the master ? In what circumstances the rents of lands should be paid in money ? 

 In what, in kind? And at what time they should be paid? Whether corns 

 should be sold by measure or by weight ? What is the best and most equal 

 way of hiring and conducting servants ? And what is the most proper method 

 to abolish the practice of giving of vails ? ^\^^at is the best method of getting 

 public highways made and repaired : Whether by turnpike-law, as in many 

 places in Great Britain? by County or parish work? by tax? or by what other 

 method ? What is the best method of converting moor ground into araljle or 

 good pasture ground ; and whether this may not be done by properly fallowing 

 the ground, and sowing it with grass seeds, without either lime or manure. 



