690 
Report on the Exhibition of Implements, 
mire and mud, and really saw the Show, will agree with me as 
to its surpassing excellence, though they may have wished for 
their own comfort that it had been smaller. 11,878 articles, 
distributed through 704 stands, required more time to look over 
than most people have at their disposal, and the Judges, 
Messrs. Barral, Kimber, and Cranfield, assisted by Mr. Ander- 
son and Mr. Rich, deserve all praise for the untiring industry 
they displayed in mastering the details of such a vast and varied 
display. Some disappointment was felt at the comparatively 
small and unimportant nature of the foreign exhibits, yet even 
here there were valuable lessons to be learnt. The Dairy 
Appliances, as seen in the International Dairy, and especially 
the, to us, entirely new invention for separating cream from 
milk by centrifugal force, were interesting and instructive. 
The apparatus for hatching, rearing, and feeding poultry, indi- 
cated an industry in France which it will be a disgrace to us 
if we fail to imitate and improve upon. 
It will be seen by the Judges' selection, that the excellence of the 
English exhibits consisted not so much in the presence of actual 
novelties, which were few, as in the improvement and develop- 
ment of machinery already introduced. So lively, however, is 
the enterprise in the line of self-binding mechanism for reaping 
machines, an enterprise fostered and developed by the efforts of 
the Society, so numerous were the different inventions, and so 
impossible to judge of merit without thorough trials, that the 
Judges wisely decided to abstain from any notice, trusting that 
the Society would see fit to make them the subject of special trials 
at the Carlisle Meeting. It would therefore be premature to 
pass any opinion, and I limit myself to saying that the problem 
of an effectual string-binder seems in a fair way of solution. 
The remarks made by Mr. John Hemsley and myself in the 
Reports of the Bristol Meeting touching the work of jNIiscel- 
laneous Judges, and the award of Silver Medals, has resulted in 
important modifications, which there is reason to think will prove 
advantageous to the public and to the exhibitors. It is especially 
important that so valuable a distinction should not be awarded 
to a novelty until the same has been subjected to a thoroughly 
searching trial. The following regulations were issued Hy the 
Council : — 
Selveb Medals. 
1. There are Tea Silver Medals, the award of which the Judges appointed 
by the Council have the power of recommending in cases of sufficient merit in 
iS'ew Implements exhibited at the London Exhibition. 
2. These Medals cannot in any case be awarded to any implement, unless the 
principle of the implement, or of the improvement of it, be entirely new. No 
Medal shall be awarded by the Judges without the consent of the Stewards, and 
no Commendation of Miscellaneous Articles shall be made by the Judges. ■ 
