Peninsula Enterprise, August 10, 1882

THE FAIR.

Tourists and sportsmen -- Other recreation - FairsFarmers -- InnovationFields -- Fertilizer

The Eastern Shore agricultural fair commences, as announced for weeks through our columns, on the 29th of this month, and to it we wish to call especial attention in this issue, if our people need to be reminded of a matter fraught with so much interest to them -- to every one of them -- whatever his avocation and, however remote the prospect of competing successfully for any of the premiums to be awarded there. To sustain a proposition of so broad and comprehensive a character, we do not purpose to recur to that general proposition, which is, as it were, at the finger ends of every youth in our land -- that agriculture is the foundation stone upon which every industry is built, and from which it derives its sustenance and support -- though we do not wish to convey the idea that we controvert that proposition. On the contrary, we admit the correctness of it, but while we do so, it is our purpose to treat of the practical lessons taught us in agriculture of late years in our midst, which admits of specifications, and to that end we submit that the farmers in certain parts of our county are much more thrifty and their lands are much better cultivated than in other localities. Nor will an inquiry into the cause of it develop the fact that in one section the soil is better naturally, that the resources for manuring are more extensive, or that the facilities for shipping produce originally were superior to what they were in other sections. On the contrary the parts of our county less developed are susceptible of a higher state of improvement in many cases, because of the superior facilities presented by a broader area of marsh and woodland, from which resources for manuring purposes are obtained. These assertions being true, and no one will question them, we believe, who are informed in the matter, the query then becomes a pertinent one why it is so. Will not the solution be found in the fact that in the localities most thrifty the farmers are so because of the comparison made by them with each other of their crops, the mode of cultivating them and of the rivalry among them to excel each other? That interchange of thought and experience was made sometimes around their farms, at other times in their grange meetings and on their fair grounds, but wherever made, the stimulus was applied that had the desired effect. And if our surmises are then correct, that the interest of farmers are promoted by a comparison of the result of their labors, then where can it be better made, if every farmer will bring some offering to the altar which at the fair ground has been consecrated to them? It matters not if they do not secure a premium. That is a secondary object, and not the one for which fairs were instituted. They were intended to stimulate us rather to advance our interests by the lessons there taught by those whose experience is riper and success greater than ours, and while we may not secure premiums, those who do not will have their reward -- if they profit by the experience of their more successful friends, and are thereby taught to improve and till their lands more skillfully, to sow their seeds at times most suitable to their germination, how to cultivate their crops, when to reap them -- in fact if they are in any way benefitted by the lessons learned there. Then let the offering made at the fair be of such as we have, and let it be a hearty one, and then not only will greater success be given to the fair by the variety of the exhibits and we will have done our duty, but we will have advanced one step at least towards reaping the rewards which for the present belong to others.