The Sun.
London, England, 1865-09-22 00:00:00

butter, and contains some of the finest stocked farms
that can be found. It remains for you to decide
whether you will take a step in advance. But do
nothing in a hurry. Well consider everything. Time
is precious, but truth is more precious than time, and
therefore it is for you calmly to consider what I have
said to-day. I have thrown out these rough hints,
but I hope you will ponder over them, and I trust
they will have the result which I sincerely desire. I
ask you to drink " Prosperity to the Royal and Cen-
tral Bucks Agricultural Association. (Cheers.)
Mr. J. TREADWELL responded.
Mr. DAUNCY, in highly eulogistic terms, proposed
" The Health of the Chairman."

The toast was drunk with the greatest enthusiasm.

The CHAIRMAN, in responding to the toast, said—l
have taken the great liberty to-night to give good
advice, and it is said that every one who does that is
sure to repent it. But my confidence in my consti-
tuents is so great that I have broken through that
general rule. ''Mr. Dauncy says that if it should turn
out that my account of the state of the wheat crop be
correct, it would be, to translate his eloquent and
graceful language in prose, something in my favour.
Allow me to suggest, what I did not remind you of
before—the first prize cup to-day has been given to
a cross between a Down and a Cotswold. (Cheers.)
And the observations which I made at one of your
meetings last year—not in the proud position of a
president, but in the humbler capacity of one of your
representatives—have been sanctioned and confirmed
by the decision of your admirable judges. I think,
therefore, that you may place confidence in the re-
port which I have given you on the root crops in
the north of England. I was much pleased with
the remarks of Mr. Treadwell in responding to the
toast of " Prosperity to the Institution." I certainly
agree with him in Ihe hint he threw out, that if we
could establish this Buckinghamshire association
totally independent of all little associations interfer-
ing (mind that) with no little associations, it would
be most desirable that it should visit periodically
different places in the county. It should go to New-
port, to Eton, to Amersham, to Buckingham, and
other places, and this would create an excitement,
an emulation, something like what we hear of at
Peterborough, and, instead of receiving a few pounds
as entrance money to view the yard, we should re-
ceive very considerable sums. I also entirely agree
with Mr. Treadwell that, whatever may be our views
on this subject, it is impossible to act with any energy
or decision at this time, when this terrible cattle cala-
mity is impending over us. I would not venture to
speculate on the origin of this great pestilence ; all
I can say is, that when I read the account of the
cattle plague published by the Privy Council, and
the remedies that were to be applied, it seemed to
me that it was not a plague of recent origin. I
thought I had read in the third Georgic of " Virgil"
—unfortunately a long time ago—an account which
in the minutest details touches this question. My
idea was that as her Majesty's Ministers are obliged
to rethain in London—at least some of them—and
some of them at least being men of classical habits
and tastes, they had given us a free translation
of the third Georgic, by way of a description of
the cattle plague and the remedies to be applied.
We have the sighs and moans, the tears and
groans, the withering of the flesh, and the ultimate
corruption—all symptoms exactly the same as have
been described. But what is most remarkable is
that the remedies are also exactly the same. You
are to kill the beasts, dig a deep ditch and bury them
immediately. Well, even the very hide is to be
sacrificed—neque erat coriis uses—so that you see
even in the time of Virgil they had the same com-
plaint, although they did not call it the Russian
plague, no doubt because they had never heard of
Russia. (Laughter.) But the symptoms were the
same, they bUried the animals in the same way, and
they even included in the destruction that hide to
which the farmer and the grazier might naturally
cling, even with disease and corruption, as some-
thing which could not be infected. (Cheers and
laughter.) I thank you, gentlemen, for the way in
which you have drunk my health. It is something
to represent such men, and to preside over such a
meeting ; and it is something to have one's health
proposed by a gentleman who is not only a pro-
prietor in this county zntwlt iespectci, who is not
only a first-rate scholar, but a man who lives in the
hearts of all those who know him. (Loud cheers.)
Several other toasts were afterwards given, and
the company did not separate until a late hour.