the Chair; Robert de la Touche, Esq., M.P., Vice-President. Nothing can more strongly prove the BADNESS OF THE TIMES, and very _unfortunate state of the country_, than the necessity in which the Society finds itself of _discontinuing its premiums, from its present want of funds_. The best members of the farming classes have got so much in arrear in their subscriptions that they have declined to appear or to dine with their neighbours, and general depression damps the spirit of the most industrious and _hitherto prosperous_ cultivators." You are mistaken, Pat; it is not the _times_ any more than it is the _stars_. Bobadil, you know, imputed his beating to the _planets_: "planet-stricken, by the foot of Pharaoh!"--"No, Captain," says Welldon, "indeed it was a _stick_." It is not the _times_, dear Patrick: it is _the government_, who, having first contracted a great debt in depreciated money, are now compelling you to pay the interest at the rate of three for one. Whether this be _right_, or _wrong_, the Agriculturasses best know: it is much more their affair than it is mine; but, be you well assured, that they are only at the beginning of their sorrows. Ah! Patrick, whoever shall live only a few years will see a _grand change_ in your state! Something a _little more rational_ than "Catholic Emancipation" will take place, or I am the most deceived of all mankind. This _Debt_ is your best, and, indeed, your _only friend_. It must, at last, give the THING a _shake_, such as it never had before.--The accounts which my country newspapers give of the failure of farmers are perfectly dismal. In many, many instances they have put an end to their existence, as the poor deluded creatures did who had been ruined by the South Sea Bubble! I cannot help feeling for these people, for whom my birth, education, taste, and habits give me so strong a partiality. Who can help feeling for their wives and children, hurled down headlong from affluence to misery in the space of a few months! Become all of a sudden the mockery of those whom they compelled, perhaps, to cringe before them! If the Labourers exult, one cannot say that it is unnatural. If _Reason_ have her fair sway, I am exempted from all pain upon this occasion. I have done my best to prevent these calamities. Those farmers who have attended to me are safe while the storm rages. My endeavours to stop the evil in time cost me the earnings of twenty long years! I did not sink, no, nor _bend_, beneath the heavy and reiterated blows of the accursed system, which I have dealt back blow for blow; and, blessed be God, I now see it _reel_! It is staggering about like a sheep with water in the head: turning its pate up on one side: seeming to listen, but has no hearing: seeming to look, but has no sight: one day it capers and dances: the next it mopes and seems ready to die. _Nov. 4. Sunday._