74 TlMEHRL 
which was in existence as early as 1812. The monthly 
meetings were held at the houses of the planters, and 
either begun, or more probably ended, in a dinner. At 
the meeting held on Pin. Bohemia, April 26th, 1812, it 
was decided to offer a premium for satisfactory instruc- 
tions as to the manufacture of plantain fibre, to give five 
joes to Mr. Andrew Black for the best model of a 
weaving loom, and to offer a similar premium for a 
machine suitable for spinning .plantain fibre. The 
stewards of the " Berbice Agricultural Society" were 
Messrs. Robert Taitt, Joseph McDonald, John Ross 
and Gilbert Robertson ; it appears to have flourished 
for a time and then quietly dropped out of existence 
without notice. 
The pioneer of this class of Society in Demerara was 
established in 1815. Mr. LACHLAN Cuming, the Chair- 
man, invited those gentlemen who had proposed to 
establish an Agricultural Society to meet at Marshall's 
Hotel on the 25th of September, to form regulations and 
dine together. This notice appears to have roused the 
merchants, who did not like to be excluded, the result 
being that a month later we find the " United Society of 
Merchants and Planters" proposing to dine together on 
November 15th, to celebrate the establishment of their 
Society. This led to some correspondence in the 
Chronicle and Gazette between Mr. Clayton Jennyns 
the Second Fiscal, and " Detector," the former recom- 
mending the new society to try and put down a number 
of abuses, while the latter was inclined to " pooh pooh" 
the whole affair. JENNYNS said that some jealousies and 
misunderstandings existed between the merchants and 
planters, it was therefore proposed by some friends of 
