( 303 ) 
XXIII. — Report on the Exhibition of Implements at the Shi-eivs- 
bury Meeting in 1845. Bj Josiah Parkes, Consulting Engineer 
to the Society. 
A FACT of interest to notice in the record of this meeting is, that 
the exhibition of implements was equal to the very best which had 
preceded it. It was feared by many persons that the Shrewsbury 
meeting — isolated as that town is with respect to railway convey- 
ance and communication, and lying so distant from the eastern 
and southern parts of England, where many implement-makers re- 
side — might not attract so large an assemblage of mechanical exhi- 
bitors as to render the show subservient to the extended objects of 
the Society, and correspondent to the wishes of its ardent friends. 
The writer, however, cannot call to mind the absence of a single 
known meritorious implement ; whilst he speaks the sentiments 
of the oldest appointed judges, and of many constant visitors of 
the Society's shows, in observing that no previous show-yard has 
been richer in inventions of. promise ; and that no one has con- 
tained a greater variety of well-manufactured implements. The 
stands of the exhibitors were perhaps not stocked with such num- 
bers of similar articles as on some other occasions ; but this is a 
desideratum, not an evil. The exhibitors can gain little or 
nothing by the display of a number of implements of the same 
kind and make ; these, indeed, serve only to encumber the 
ground, increase the area, and augment the cost of the show-yard, 
without contributing to its intrinsic value as an exhibition of prac- 
tical mechanical science, adapted to agriculture, which is the 
object sought by the Society. 
The following are the lists of prizes offered by the Society, and 
of the awards made by the judges. Under the head Miscellaneous 
in the list of awards are comprised all those implements which 
received premiums from the judges out of the fund of 100/. put 
at their disposition by the Council, over and above the sum 
allotted for special prizes nominated by the Council. 
For the Plough best adapted to heavy land . . Ten Sovereigns. 
For the Plough best adapted to light laud . . Ten Sovereigns. 
For the best One-way Plough Five Sovereigns. 
For the best Skim or Paring Plough .... Five Sovereigns. 
For the best Subsoil Pulverizer Ten Sovereigns. 
For the best Clod-Crusher Ten Sovereigns. 
For the best Scarifier Ten Sovereigns. 
For the best Harrow Five Sovereigns. 
