1852.] 



due in advance on the fust day of Januai 

 session after that in -vvliich he wai? elected, 



4. The sessions of the Institute shall commence annually on the 

 fii-st Saturday in December; and onjinary meetings shall beheld 

 on evciy succeeding Saturday (omitting tlio Christmas holidays) 

 until the first Saturday in April; but it shall be in the power of 

 the Council to protract the sessions, if it should seem necessary. 

 The chair may be taken when five members are present. 



5. A general meeting of the Institute shall be held annually, 

 on the second Saturday in December, at seven o'clock in the 

 evening, to receive and deliberate upon the report of the Council 

 on the state of the Institute, and to elect the officers and members 

 of the Council for the ensuing year. 



6. Persons desirous of being admitted into the Institute as 

 members, are requested to communicate with the Secretary. 



THE PROVINCIAL AGRICULTURAL SHOW, 



in the next following 



51 



€j\)t Cminiiiiiii SiiiirmiL 



TORONTO, OCTOBER, 1852. 



The Provincial Agricultural Show. 



In our present attempt to furnish the Canadian public with 

 an illustrated narrative of the Provincial Agricultural Fair, 

 recently held in the city of Toronto, we have earnestly endea- 

 voured to kee]^ in view two important objects, which can alone 

 succeed in giving to our descriptions and criticisms the practical 

 value we hope they will jiossess. 



The position of the Canadian Journal in relation to the 

 public, fully warrants us in striving to accomplish a task of 

 ackncwledged difficulty, without the suspicion of being biassed 

 by any fear of reproach, or desire to secure individual favour or 

 support. 



It has been our aim to give, first, a ti'uthful description of each 

 department of the Show ; and .secondly, to suggest, where 

 occasion offered, changes and improvements which appeared to 

 be important and useful. 



The scene of an event so interesting to Canadians as that of 

 our annual Exhibition of Industry, requires in the present 

 in.stanee a special notice ; we shall take, therefore, a preliminary 

 glance at the histoiy of the Capital of Upper Canada, together 

 with those collateral stages of progress and development which 

 appear to distinguish the advance of the Western Province in a 

 very note-worthy manner. 



But few, perhaps, among the thirty thousand visitors to the 

 Exhibition ground on Thursday, September 23rd, pemiitted 

 their thoughts to wander back to the time when the spot, so 

 densely occupied by the " pale faces," and crovrded with their 

 works of patient industry and skilful art, vv^as a wild and marshy 

 forest, tenanted only by a few -sundering Messassaugas ; or, at a 

 later date, and in the memory of numbers then present, the 

 forest suburbs of a village, which mimbered but a few hundred 

 enterpi-i,«ing settlore. 



Sixty years ago, an Indian wigwam stood alone on the spot 

 now occupied by a city containing thirty-two thousand inhabi- 

 tants, and furnished with nearly all the requirements of modern 

 civilization, and much of the energy and skill wliich characterizes 

 the age. 



Sixty years ago, the population of Upper Canada consisted of 

 a few thousand families, dispersed over a territory containing 

 upwards of forty-six thousand squara miles, enjoying but 

 a very limited means of communication between themselve.?, 

 and deriving few advantages from a chequered intercourse with 

 the world beyond tlieir own great lakes. 



At the time we write, this extensive province is peopled with 

 one million freemen, in possession of those civil and religious 

 blessings which can alone be won and enjoyed by an enterpi-ising 

 and vigorous people. 



Suiprising and even wonderful as this progress may seem to 

 be, it is but an illustration of that onward movement common to 

 the vast expanse of territory on this continent occupied by the 

 races whose mother tongue is the one in which we write. 



It is, however, a most favourable illustration, for if Upper 

 Canada were to be compared with the 



" Thirly noble nations 

 Conlederale in one," 



which lie to the East and the South, she would distance in point 

 of population twenty-two of their number, and in much that 

 ennobles and elevates a nation, she would probably throw a 

 greater number into the shade. The population of Upper 

 Canada has doubled itself within the last ten years, so also 

 has the population of Toronto. The improvements which have 

 taken place during that period, both in the Province and her 

 capital, have increased in a tenfold greater ratio. 



To confine ourselves more especially to Toronto, we may 

 perhaps furnish without exhausting the patience of our readers, 

 a few facts which will shew the direction this remarkable progress 

 has taken. 



In place of almost impassable roa^ls during the spring and 

 autumnal periods of the year, cutting off " Muddy Little York " 

 from the surrounding thinly-settled country, not much more 

 than twenty years ago, we find now, radiating from Toronto, — itself 

 a city of one hundred streets, — hundreds of miles of excellent 

 macadamised and plank highways ; three different lines of rail- 

 way in various stages of completion; eighty hcensed cabs 

 for the convenience of the citizens; a score of omnibuses and' 

 well-appointed stages for country travel ; numerous steam-boats 

 frequenting the haihour; direct communication by water, ea-^tward, 

 with the great highway of all nations — the ocean; equally 

 unintemipted access, westward, to eight States of the Union 

 without breaking bulk, and .la.stly, instantaneous communication 

 with Quebec, New York and New Orieans, together with most 

 of the intermediate cities. 



Not many years ago, the ground recently occupied bi' the 

 Provincial Agricultural Show, was a forest-covered tract, and 

 regarded by the citizens of York as altogether "in the country," 

 and so inaccessible that when the late Hon. D' A.rcy Boulton built 

 the house in the field adjoining the clover pasture where the 



