number then present exceeded ten, the members had a right to proceed
on business, and power to appoint such committees as they should
think necessary. The money contributed by this association, after the
necessary expense of the society had been deducted, was expended in
premiums for planting and husbandry; for discoveries and improvements
in chemistry, dying, and mineralogy; for promoting the ingenious arts of
drawing, engraving, casting, painting, statuary, and sculpture; for the
improvement of manufactures and machines, in the various articles
of hats, crapes, druggets, mills, marbled-paper, ship-blocks,
spinning-wheels, toys, yarn, knitting, and weaving. They likewise
allotted sums for the advantage of the British colonies in America,
and bestowed premiums on those settlers who should excel in curing
cochineal, planting logwood-trees, cultivating olive-trees, producing
myrtle-wax, making potash, preserving raisins, curing saffiour, making
silk and wines, importing sturgeon, preparing isinglass, planting
hemp and cinnamon, extracting opium and the gum of the persimon-tree,
collecting stones of the mango, which should be found to vegetate in the
West Indies; raising silk-grass, and laying out provincial gardens. They
moreover allowed a gold medal in honour of him who should compose the
best treatise on the arts of peace, containing an historical account of
the progressive improvements of agriculture, manufactures, and commerce
in the kingdom of England, with the effects of those improvements on the
morals and manners of the people, and pointing out the most proper means
for their future advancement. In a word, the society is so numerous,
the contributions so considerable, the plan so judiciously laid, and
executed with such discretion and spirit, as to promise much more
effectual and extensive advantage to the public than ever accrued from
all the boasted academies of Christendom. The artists of London had long
maintained a private academy for improvement in the art of drawing from
living figures; but in order to extend this advantage, which was not
attained without difficulty and expense, the duke of Richmond, a young
nobleman of the most amiable character, provided a large apartment
at Whitehall, for the use of those who studied the arts of painting,
sculpture, and engraving; and furnished it with a collection of original
plaster casts from the best antique statues and busts at Rome and
Florence. Here any learner had