ANNUAL REPORT—SOCIETIES. 
97 
The membership already embraces a large number of those 
citizens who, in various ways, have contributed most to the 
knowledge we already have of the resources of our state. It 
also includes many gentlemen eminent for their services in the 
promotion of the useful arts, together with a considerable num¬ 
ber no less distinguished in the world of letters. 
The meetings hitherto held for the reading of original papers 
and for the discussion of important questions have been highly 
successful, and there is every reason to hope that the institu¬ 
tion will meet the expectation of its friends and accomplish 
great good in the state. 
With a view of establishing a relation of practical intimacy 
beween the two institutions, the constitution of this society 
was so amended at the last annual meeting as to make the 
president and general secretary of the academy members ex- 
officio of the executive board of the society. Resolutions were 
also adopted tendering the academy the cordial sympathies of 
the society and the joint use of the apartment at present occu¬ 
pied by the society’s collections. 
THE CONDITION OF THE STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 
Was never so prosperous as now. The renewal of its annual 
publications has awakened new interest, and its influence for 
good seems to be more widely and universally felt. 
The great pecuniary success of the last exhibition not only 
relieved the societv of all embarrassment, but also enabled it 
4/ 
to make wdiat was considered a very important investment in 
real estate, and still report a considerable balance in the 
treasury. 
The real estate referred to consists of the well-known and 
beautiful state fair grounds of Madison, being a faction over 
fifty-three acres; which entire tract, carrying a perpetual lease 
of the improvements thereon, was purchased for $6,000. 
A contract for this property was made by the president and 
secretary soon after the exhibition of 1869, when no other 
locality w r as certainly available for subsequent exhibitions, and 
7—Ao. Tit. 
