130 
Af/riculture and the House of Russell. 
certificates presented by competitors for his prize of fifty guineas, 
offered to the person who should, between the previous June 
and Christmas, have expended the largest sum (not less than 
sixty guineas) in the purchase of breeding ewes or theaves of 
" the New Leicester or Southdown breed." ^ About 3 p.m. the 
company returned to the Abbey, where the Duke entertained 
some 200 noblemen, gentlemen, and yeomen at dinner in the 
large hall. Here tables were laid, " which branched out in 
three directions, but so contrived as to have but one head, at 
which his Grace presided." On this occasion Prince William of 
Gloucester (a nephew of George III.) was at the Duke's right 
hand, and Lord John Russell, his brother, afterwards sixth Duke, 
" sat as croupier." After dinner the King's health was drunk, 
and this was followed by a number of toasts and " sentiments," 
such as " Success to Agriculture," " A Good Crop of Wheat," 
" The Fleece," " The Plough," " The Memory of Mr. Bakewell," 
and the like. This occupied the time till six o'clock, when the 
company again proceeded to the farm-yard, where various at- 
tractions awaited them — for example, "a very fine hog, the 
property of Mr. Pickford, wagon -master, supposed to weigh 
about 100 stone"; and, on another occasion, "a very extra- 
ordinary fat three-shear wether, of the New Leicester breed," 
29G lbs. live weight, admitted by the company to be the fattest 
sheep they had ever seen.^ In the meantime, the sheep-shearers 
continued their work " in a place conveniently adapted for the 
whole of the meeting to see them." After witnessing their per- 
formance, the Duke conducted his visitors to the " Evergreens," to 
see some select Devonshire oxen, and thence to the water meadow, 
near Birchmoor House, in Crawley Lane, where there 'jvere 
some tine cows of the same breed. 
On the second day the tups were first shown, singly, after 
which sweepstakes of five guineas each, made by the Duke of 
Bedford, Lord Winchelsea, Lord Somerville, and Air. Bouverie, 
for the best two-year-old Devon heifers, were determined in 
favour of Lord Winchelsea. Mr. Garrard,^ " the modeller of 
cattle," then placed before the company his models of the prize 
cattle shown at the previous Smithfield Show, and of other 
noted animals; after which attention was directed to improved 
' At the death of lii.s Grace these premiums were discontinued, in accord- 
ance with his avowed intention, as lie felt that the object in view — the intro- 
duction of these breeds into the county — had been attained. 
'•^ Details of the weight of this sheep are given in the " Annals of Agricul- 
ture," Vol. XXXllI. pp. :517-I8. 
• George (Jarrard, an animal painter and modeller, born 17C0. He practised 
largc'ly in modc-llintr, and in 1802 was elected an Associate of the Iloyal 
Academy, lie died at lirompton in 1820. 
