44 Report of the Senior Steicard of Live Stock at Bristol. 
must have thoroughly understood this at Bristol, if they never 
did before. 
The traditional " men from Bristol citv, who took a ship and 
went to sea," are represented in these davs bj a guild, called 
" The Society of ^lerchant \ enturers." These gentlemen fol- 
lowed the example of the Mayor and of the Local Committee in 
entertaining the Council and Officers of the Society at a sump- 
tuous banquet ; and thus for three successive evenings were the 
labours of the day brought to a harmonious close. 
It is said that every medal has its reverse, and unfortunately 
the Bristol Meeting affords another illustration of the truth of 
this dictum. Two accidents, one of which was fatal, occurred 
to grooms during the week. The first happened on the judging 
day to probably the most experienced Show - going servant 
in the whole Exhibition. If any stranger had asked who was 
the most knowing, the most handy, the most useful man in 
the Yard to attend and show-off animals for exhibition, every 
officer of the Society, and probably most other people whose 
opinion was reliable, would at once have said " Lord Elles- 
mere's Dan for as Dan, and nothing else, he was familiarly 
known, and yet that man was killed by a kick from one of his 
Lordship's fillies in the judging ring. 
The other accident was the result of skylarking out of the 
ring by two young lads on ponies. They took the opportunity 
of retiring from the parade-ground to their stables to get up 
an impromptu race, much to the danger of the public. The 
result was that they cannoned against each other, and one of the 
lads paid the penalty of his disregard of instructions in the form 
of a broken leg. 
The mention of these lamentable occurrences suggests the 
performance of a duty w hich is expected of the senior Steward, 
and that is, to give his colleagues on the Council the result of 
his obsenations and reflections on the rules and regulations 
w hich have been in force during his four years' term of office, 
with a view to their improvement in the future. It is not 
always desirable that the suggestions of the senior Steward 
should be published, at any rate until they have been considered 
in Council ; but on this occasion I feel that the few remarks I 
have to make ought to be carefully digested by every exhibitor 
of live stock at the Shows of the Royal Agricultural Society. 
The rules of the Society relating to the live-stock depart- 
ment of the Country Meetings appear to have been drawn up 
originally with the view that the exhibitors would co-operate 
with the Stewards in making the Show attractive to the public. 
Of late years, as the Exhibitions have grown in magnitude, the 
Stewards have found it increasingly difficult to induce exhi- 
