xxxviii Report to the General Meeting, 



by the Council for the year 1852. The latter comprise distinct 

 classes of prizes for the Sussex breed of Cattle, the Romney 

 Marsh or Kentish Sheep, and Domestic Poultry ; having 

 reference respectively to the counties of Sussex, Kent, and 

 Surrey, constituting the district of the Country Meeting to be 

 held next year at Lewes. They have made the rule more 

 stringent by which fines are levied on exhibitors for not send- 

 ing to the show the stock they have entered, and for which 

 the Society provide accommodation in the show-yard. They have 

 resolved that no prize of the Society shall be given to bulls 

 exceeding five years old ; they have limited the competition 

 in the class of agricultural stallions hitherto known as that of any 

 age, to horses that are above two years old; and they have decided 

 to require in the class of three years' old heifers not in milk the 

 same certificate as in the case of incalf-cows not in milk, before 

 paying the amount of the prize, namely, a certificate that such 

 incalf-heifer had in due course produced a live calf. The Coun- 

 cil have under their anxious consideration two most important 

 questions connected with their Country Meeting : namely, the 

 best mode of appointing the Judges, and the conditions under 

 which their attention should be directed to a veterinary inspection 

 of the animals. The Council consider that the stock to which 

 the prizes of the Society are awarded ought not only in the 

 opinion of the Judges to be the best specimens of their particular 

 class in the yard, but that in condition and function they ought 

 also to be fully 'qualified to propagate their species, without com- 

 municating to their offspring any tendency to hereditary disease 

 or imperfection; and, in order more clearly to call attention to the 

 circumstances under which such tendency might be apprehended, 

 the Council have offered a prize of 20Z. for the best Essay on the 

 subject. The Council have received from Colonel Le Couteur 

 the scale of points for Jersey cattle which has been found so 

 satisfactory in enabling the Judges of the Royal Agricultural 

 Society in that island to arrive at uniform decisions. At his 

 request these points were placed by the Council in the hands of 



