of mowing-machines, hay-tedders, horse-rakes, and many other implements, without a practical trial on the field?

This mode of making awards opens the door to great injustice to competitors, and ultimately to the whole farming community. With many kinds of implements it is by no means easy to arrive at a correct conclusion as to their comparative merits, even by a careful trial, and without such trial it is simply impossible.

Now, an award under such circumstances, often made on the judgment of an individual member of the committee, not only works to the disadvantage. of unsuccessful competitors, but the successful competitor uses this endorsement to establish the reputation of a machine which, on a careful, practical trial, may prove to be inferior. It amounts to an imposition upon the farming community. The farmer has a right to suppose that such awards are based on comparative merit, and this he knows can be ascertained only by trial. He has a right, therefore, to suppose that such trial has actually been made.

CHARLES L. FLINT,

BOSTON, January 27, 1869.

Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture.

of mowing-machines, hay-tedders, horse-rakes, and many other implements, without a practical trial on the field?

This mode of making awards opens the door to great injustice to competitors, and ultimately to the whole farming community. With many kinds of implements it is by no means easy to arrive at a correct conclusion as to their comparative merits, even by a careful trial, and without such trial it is simply impossible.

Now, an award under such circumstances, often made on the judgment of an individual member of the committee, not only works to the disadvantage of unsuccessful competitors, but the successful competitor uses this endorsement to establish the reputation of a machine which, on a careful, practical trial, may prove to be inferior. It amounts to an imposition upon the farming community. The farmer has a right to suppose that such awards are based on comparative merit, and this he knows can be ascertained only by trial. He has a right, therefore, to suppose that such trial has actually been made.

CHARLES L. FLINT,

Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture.

BOSTON, January 27, 1869.