3-008-743 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Northamptonshire Agricultural Society's show in Burghley Park, near Stamford, [Lincolnshire], 1862. 'From the Lord Lieutenant to the gentle shepherd, the cunning worker in iron and the humble cultivator of kidney potatoes, has each alike his place and distinction. Ladies, indeed, have not solely their fruits, and flowers, and plants to attract them, but, the old boorish, selfish system being now utterly uprooted, are specially invited by a line on the titlepage of the catalogue to grace the dinner with their presence. This county meeting [on the Marquess of Exeter's estate], is by no means the first of the kind, and may help to set the type for many others. There is no doubt that not half enough has been made of such gatherings, and that, more for lack of thought than of heart, many parks have been so hermetically sealed against them that they have been driven to take refuge in dreary, flat meadows in the outskirts of towns, where they lost half their significance and interest'. From "Illustrated London News", 1862.