The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-07-23 00:00:00

GRAND DINNER IN THE PAVILION

The grand dinner of the members of the society took place
yesterday, in the spacious pavilion in the yard of the Old
Infirmary, which is described in the supplement. Four
o'clock was the hour appointed, but long before that time
the spacious structure was crowded. The arrangements
were admirable, both for ingress and egress. The accommo-
dation for the press was excellent, and the representativas of
it were treated with courtesy. We have the greater pleasure

in mentioning this facts, became we have felt it our duty to
censure the officers of the society for the miserable arrange-
ments for their accommodation in every other respect.
The dinner, which was of course cold. was supplied by Mr.
Radley, of the Adelphi Hotel. It was excellent. We un-
derstand that 2900 guests sat down.
Shortly after four o'clock, the chairman of the society,
Philip Pusey, Esq., M. P., entered the building, accompanied
by the principal guests, and took the chair. At the same

moment the vice-chairman, Henry Handley, Esq. entexed,

and took his seat as vice-president.
On the right of the President were seated—the Mayor of

Liverpool, Lord Sandon, M.P., the Earl of Denbigh,
Lord Ingestre, M.P., Lord F. Egerton, M.P., Earl Spencer,
Sir Charles Burrell, M.P., Sir Charles Morgan, Lord Lis-
burne, Sir Thomas Brancker, J. Wilson Patten, M.P.,
and Professor Daubeney. On the left of the President
were—Lord Stanley, M.P., Earl Talbot, the Earl of Chi-
chester, Professor Buckland, Lord Mostyn, Professor John-
stone, the Earl of Aylsford, the Hon. L. Mostyn, M.P., Sir
John Mordaunt, M.P., Robert Palmer, M.P., Viscount
Emlyn, M.P., and Lord Blantyre, &c., &c.
Thos. M. Milnes, Esq., M.P.,
The following gentlemen officiated as glee-singers, and
contributed much to the enjoyment of the evening :—Mr.
George Holden, Mr. Ball, Mr. Boothby, Mr. George Lunt,
Mr. Hornby, Mr. Earnshaw, Mr. Richardson, Mr. William
George, Mr. Davies, Mr. Andrews, Mr. J. Lunt, and
Mr. Stott.

The dinner concluded about a quarter past five. The
cloth having been withdrawn, and Non nobis domine chaunted,
..The PRESIDENT rose to propose the first toast. He said,

r. Handley and Gentlemen !

Let us drink our first toast,

that toast Which, as loyal and dutiful subjects, we are bound
to drink, and which we are ready and glad to drink "the
health of our Sovereign, Queen Victoria, with loyal, and
dutiful, and hearty honours." (Three times three.)
National Anthem, "God save the Queen."

The PRESIDENT said the next toast which they were
bound to drink, and which they were most ready to drink,
was the health of Her Majesty the Queen Dowager, the
Prince Albert, and the rest of the Royal Family. (Three
times three)

Lord STANLEY then rose, and was greeted with loud cheers.
His Lordship said, Mr. President and Gentlemen,—l have
received not the permission but the command of the Presi-
dent, to propose to you a toast ; and I can venture to assure
you, in all sincerity, notwithstanding the kindness of the re-
ception which you have given me personally, that nothing
short of that authority, and of those commands, would have
induced me to obtrude myself upon the attention of a meet-
ing like the present, upon a subject such as the present, and
upon which I am deeply and painfully conscious that it would
be the height of presumption in me to hope to think I could
add anything to the information of such an assemblage, and
which I have attended in the earnest desire of manifesting
my concurrence in the great objects which this meeting has
at heart; and, in the hope not of conferring, but that I might
myself receive, much practical information by so doing.
(Hear, hear.) But, gentlemen, it is impossible for me to
look around me, at this splendid assembly which I see here
collected, without congratulating you—without congratulat-
ing the country at large—upon the probable, nay the certain,
effects of the institution of this valuable Society ; and I feel
convinced, that in proposing to you to drink " Success and
prosperity to the Royal Agricultural Society of England," in
your zeal and enthusiasm for the toast, you will, if you can-
not forget, at least forgive, the deficiency of the proposers.
Gentlemen, let me, in the first place, congratulate you in
the name of English feeling, and in the name of sound
national sense, upon the practical proof which you have this
day obtained of the wisdom of that, which is, as I hold it,
the fundamental and the essential rule of the proceedings
of this society, that all that pertains to political contentions
and questions be altogether banished. (Loud cheers.) It
is matter of no little congratulation that at a moment when
the country is recovering, and hardly recovering, from that
ferment inseparable upon a dissolution of parliament, and a
general election ; men of all sentiments, of all political
parties, of all opinions, are met together here in harmony,
and in concert, to deliberate and to consult upon the great
national interests of the empire ; and especially upon the
present occasion, and in this place; and gratifying must it
be to find that in this, the greatest commercial town of this
country, of the greatest commercial country in the universe,
(Cheers) an assembly unprecedented in point of numbers,
unrivalled in point of respectability, and character and sta-
tion, is met together, and graced by the presence of the
principal magistrate of this great commercial town, (Cheers)
for the purpose of doing humour to the cause, and of sup-
porting the interests of English agriculture. (Loud cheers)
Gentlemen, in such a meeting it would be idle in me to des-
cant upon the immense national importance which attaches
to the agricultural interest, upon the immense importance of
that noble and honourable profession or science, call it which
you will, upon which devolves the arduous but at the same
time the vitally essential task of producing the first necessaries
of life, meat and bread, for a population redundant to excess,
and increasing its members in this wealthy, commercial, and
manufacturing country, at the astounding rate of little less
than a thousand in each day that passes. (Hear, hear.)
But, gentlemen, I must freely say to you that in my judg-
ment and in my conviction, so far from looking übon it
as a discouraging, I look upon it as a most encouraging
symptom and character of the times, that our agriculture, at
least in science whatever it may be in practice, and in these
matters science and practice must be intimately combined,
with regard to its probable results upon this great object is
yet, we may almost say, in the infancy of its condition.
(Hear, hear.) We look back at the present period with a
smile of indulgent pity upon the feeble efforts of agriculture
at a time not long gone by ; and we may look with some in-
dulgence, but also with some surprise, at the limited views
we now venture to entertain compared to what, half a century
hence, I firmly believe they will have accomplished. (Hear,
hear.) And, gentlemen, let us give praise and honour where
praise and honour are due. (Cheers.) I believe that to our
northern brethren we are mainly and in a great degree in-
debted for the progress which of late years has been made in
the science of agriculture. (Cheers.) Labouring under the dis-
advantages of a soil of certainly not more than average fertility,
of a climate even yet more ungenial and more variable than
ours,—nay, perhaps, gentlemen, upon account of these very
disadvantages—the prudence, the foresight, the perseverance,
and the skill of Scotland, led them to contend with natural
obstacles, successfully to compete and overcome them, and
to set to us, their southern brethren, an example of what
may be done by perseverance against difficulties of every
class. (Hear.) Gentlemen, I give to the agriculturists of
Scotland the credit which I believe to have been done to

them ; but I give also to the agriculturists of England the
credit which is due to them, for no display
of oofouwnige(ieHnoregeeroaoneruoit
jealousy, or of hostile rivalry, or of absence
to follow a good example freely set before them.
vill
From the time that Scotland took the lead, we
ashamed in this southern portion of the empire,
o
to begin to
inquire for Scotch bailiffs, for Scotch ploughmen,bego
'and to in-
quire into the Scotch system • and having to inquire,
the agriculturists of England were not slow to follow, where
practical experience, combined with science, proved to them
they might follow safely and with advantage to themselves,
and to the interests of the country. (Cheers.) Gentlemen,
it_heprofirst step, the great step, the step without which
iblireevevenient is hopeless, was achieved, when agricultu-
rists, both landlords and tenants, began to be sensible of
productive the deficiencies of their own system—when they began to
(hear"e
that the.remightbe something better, something more
advantageous, something cheaper to themselves, something
rivalry!)
considered as
lowed,— to the country than they had heretofore fol..
hear)—and when they began by generous
first step, and it
endeavour to compete with those who they hitherto
part of all classes
their instructors. (Cheers.) There was the
(Hear.) That,
stwe was the great step of practical improvement.
none without great an
was met by cordial concurrence upon the
British agriculturists ; it was met in
various parts of the country with various successes, but in
merited success by the exertions of
local agricultural societies in the different 'districts, perform-
sphere, and upon a smaller scale,
that, or a great portion of
that, which the Royal Agricultural
Society o fEngl a n d n ow performs upon a larger, a more ex-
tended, and proportionably
more
armore useful sphere. (Cheers.)
Gentlemen, when I say a
minean to refer to the extended com-
petition
eheexrtentdheedr, and proportionably
a moreuws useful
is sphere,thel
basis
of
allnowledge of improvement,
and the best stimulus to successful exertion;—(hear)—and
e
as each individual farmer,
vi
materially inclined, '
societyis no agricultural
in his neighbourhood, is
if he
takes any pride at all in his own stock and in his own land,
to be soon self,satisfied with his own •
Iprovements
produce, so the local agricultural societiesm and his
o fhis country,con-
fined within a small sphere, proportionably limit their powers
of competition, and proportionably create an undue degree of
serf applause in those who in their limited sphere find them-