25 
It has often been noticed that institutions which in 
other countries are originated and thrive only under the 
fostering care of the State, are here initiated and nurtured 
by private effort and enterprise. The history of the 
Smithfield Club is an illustration of this fact. 
What may be termed its democratic character accounts for 
a certain measure of the popularity it has attained. But the 
main cause of its long-continued progress and prosperity is 
without doubt the strong conviction that the aim of the Club, 
in seeking by all possible means to improve the stock of the 
country, is a national one, and one that has not lost its import- 
ance because at the present time our agricultural conditions 
have changed. It is this conviction which has not only 
gained for the Club the strong adherence of some of our 
most noted agriculturists in the past, but continues to 
draw to itself the support of the Royal Family, the 
nobility, and others interested in the objects for which it 
exists. | 
The relations of the Royal Agricultural Society in its 
early days to the Smithfield Club has already been alluded 
to, but that is not the only Society which owes its existence 
directly or indirectly to the influence or example of the 
Club. Apart, however, from any particular case, if 
imitations of its aims or its methods be considered a proof 
of parentage, then its progeny is a large one. 
But meanwhile the Smithfield Club has kept its own 
place. Instead of detracting from its influence or 
prospects, these offshoots have only in the main emphasized 
its position as The National Fat Stock Show of Great 
Britain, and the final arbiter in the competitions of the 
many great societies which have sprung into existence 
throughout the kingdom; and after a century of full and 
useful work, its entry on another stage of its existence as an 
Incorporated Society finds it, like the nation of which it is 
a typical institution, strong in the consciousness of its 
strength and‘ power to carry out its own mission, and 
rejoicing in the number and importance of its vigorous 
offshoots. 
E.. J.P: 
December, 1900. 
