14 
Agricultural Progress and 
the- Society to guide his judgment, and he felt himself so entirely 
in the hands of the salesman in attendance, that he made no 
purchase at all. In this case he would no doubt have been quite 
safe in Messrs. Ransom e's hands ; but had the Society adopted 
the " Trophy" instead of the " Trial" system, the competition 
between rival makers, which has caused such persevering efforts 
to be made for the production of winning implements, would 
have been equally active in getting up imposing; displays of well- 
grouped machines ; and it requires no great effort of imagination 
to realize the utter bewilderment of a practical farmer attending 
the Leeds or Worcester show to select and order implements, 
walking down mile alter mile of the sheds (as they would have 
been), all filled with equally imposing-looking wares, and hearing 
each in succession described by stentorian lungs as the best, the 
newest, the only implements worthy of a moment's notice. 
We shall be told that in some few instances (the Bath and 
West of England Society is quoted by Mr. Morton) the com- 
petitive system has been abandoned without any injurious conse- 
quences. The management of that Society is in very able hands, 
and if they continue their present system it will be because they 
find it answer ; hut if not only the Bath and West of England, 
but all the local societies in Great Britain, abandoned the com- 
petitive system, it would not affect the argument in the smallest 
degree. As long as the National Agricultural Society continues 
periodically to devote its funds and its energies to an efficient 
trial of all agricultural machines which seek distinction, so long 
will the failures find it as impossible to obtain purchasers in the 
showyard of the Bath and West of England Society as in that of 
the Royal Agricultural Society itself, and so long also will the 
-prize-winners be regarded with attention at every agricultural 
meeting in the kingdom. 
Mr. Morton mentions that there have been instances where the 
bestowal of prizes or the suggestions of the Royal Agricultural 
Society's judges have been positively injurious to the efficiency 
of certain implements, and consequently to the trade of their 
makers. We shall not for a moment question the accuracy of 
this statement, nor is there any antecedent improbability in the 
supposition that out of the many thousand decisions and opinions 
which have been given by judges at the Society's various meet- 
ings, some may have been erroneous, and some useful suggestions 
may have been so badly carried out in practice as to have resulted 
in failure ; but the general tenor of the communications made by 
implement-makers to the stewards and judges has been so com- 
pletely of an opposite character — so many exhibitors have been 
grateful for hints, and have attributed more or less of their com- 
