PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 727 
together in Edinburgh a small group of distinguished men who formed them- 
selves into the Select Society. The purposes were the discussion of philosophical 
questions and practice in public speaking. The idea came from Allan Ramsay, 
an artist and son of the poet. Alexander Wedderburn was elected Chairman 
(as Lord Loughborough, the first Scottish Lord Chancellor of England, he 
affixed the Seal that gave Sir John Sinclair his Board of Agriculture), and among 
the members were Adam Smith, David Hume, Henry Home (later Lord Kames), 
and William Robertson (afterwards Principal of Edinburgh University). This 
Society soon attracted all Edinburgh residents who were in any way dis- 
tinguished. But in one respect it was a failure; certain members, we are in- 
formed, always talked, and the wisdom of others was in danger of being sup- 
pressed and unavailing. It is said, for example, that Adam Smith and David 
Hume never opened their lips! It appears therefore to have been decided that 
the Society’s genius should be turned to practical objects, and within the Select 
Society a new organisation, the Edinburgh Society, was formed in 1755, ‘for 
the encouragement of Arts, Sciences, Manufactures and Agriculture "—i.e., for 
the same purposes as the Society of Arts had been established in London a few 
months earlier. 
An account of the Edinburgh Society is given by Ramsay in his ‘ History of the 
Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland,’ from which it appears that the 
methods of this society—the offering of premiums for live-stock and implements 
—were those which have since been everywhere adopted. In 1759, for example. 
we read that at the show of horses nine stallions were exhibited, ‘all very good.’ 
But the goodness of the stallions and of the objects did not bring prosperity 
to the Edinburgh Society; talent was more abundant than money in Edinburgh 
in the middle of the eighteenth century, subscriptions remained unpaid, the pre- 
mium list had to be reduced, and finally the Select and the Edinburgh Societies 
disappeared together in 1765. 
The success of the Royal Society of England and the influence of the Honour- 
able the Society of Improvers of Scotland did not escape notice on the Continent, 
and after the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748), when France realised the necessity 
of developing her agriculture, societies were established in that country. The 
Marquis of Tourbilli, a well-known writer on agriculture, took the lead in forming 
a society at Tours; a second important society was formed in Brittany ; and so 
useful did they prove that by 1761, Harte informs us, there were thirteen .at 
work for the improvement of agriculture in France. Each society was assigned 
a district, and in the larger districts subsidiary societies were formed; of these 
there were nineteen in 1761. 
The movement spread to other countries about the same time. In 1751 
George II founded an agricultural society in Hanover, which awarded half- 
yearly premiums for dissertations on agricultural subjects. In 1759 the Swiss 
established a society in Berne, which later became the most important agricultural 
association in Europe. An active society also began work in Tuscany before 1760. 
_ The value of the work of the early associations was also generally recognised 
in this country, and in the second half of the eighteenth century many others 
were formed. Among them may be mentioned the Gordon’s Mill (Aberdeen) 
Farming Club, the Highland and Agricultural Society, the British Wool Society, 
the Norwich, York. and Bath Societies, and the local agricultural societies of 
Doncaster, Cornwall, Brecon, and Leicester. 
Before concluding these notes on the early associations let me ask your atten- 
_ tion very briefly to some of the evidences of their influence on the agriculture 
of a later period. 
The chief aims of the early societies were to impress upon landowners in 
the first place the interest afforded by the study of acriculture and in the second 
the duty of providing an increased supply of food for the nation. Nothing is 
more marked in the writings of such Improvers as Blith, Worlidge, Lisle, 
Laurence, and Mackintosh than their insistence on the importance of agriculture 
as a subject of study. Until the educated among their fellow-countrymen could 
be interested in the principles of agriculture, it was clear to these far-seeing men 
that progress could not be made. Exhortation, persuasion, and satire are em- 
ployed by turns with the object of securing attention for agricultural questions. 
