OCJT*

V

AGRICULTURAL TOUR

IN THE

UNITED STATES

PRINTED BY JOHN STARK,

AGRICULTURAL TOUR

IN

THE UNITED STATES

AND

UPPER CANADA,

WITH

MISCELLANEOUS NOTICES.

BY

CAPTAIN BARCLAY

OF URY.

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD & SONS, EDINBURGH,

AND 22, PALL MALL, LONDON.

MD.CCCXLII.

AC.HIC. OEPTv

To

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
THE LORD PANMURE,

&c. &c. &c.

MY DEAR LORD,

FROM the interest you constantly take in
everything connected with agriculture, and the benefit
which, in this part of Scotland, the practice of it has de
rived from your example and munificence, there is no one
to whom a work having reference to that subject, may
more appropriately be inscribed.

With this conviction, and with a lively remem
brance of friendship early evinced, always unvaried, and
of which I continue to receive very gratifying proofs, I
have the greatest pleasure in respectfully dedicating to
your Lordship, the following relation of my visit to the
United States and Upper Canada.

Forty years have revolved since I undertook a pe
destrian task — one of the first in which I was engaged —
on a match with the late Captain Fletcher of Balinshoe,
in Forfarshire, for the large stake of 5000 guineas a

VI DEDICATION.

side. From my having been " young" enough to attempt
it previously, for a small sum, without any preparation,
and having consequently failed, the opinion of the know
ing ones among the Athletce of the day, was decidedly
against me. On that occasion, you were not a disheart
ening doubter. I put myself in training under the ce
lebrated Jackey Smith of Ousetcn, near Easing wold in
Yorkshire, recommended by you ; and owing much to
his skilful management, I easily performed the task of
ninety miles in twenty successive hours.

I have now ventured on a task of quite another
kind — an endeavour to describe, and to suggest improve
ments in the rural affairs of a distant land.

In this I may again have been attempting what
by some may be thought hazardous ; but again I am en
couraged by your approbation of my purpose, and by that
I shall be greatly consoled, even if other opinions prove
unfavourable.

With the greatest regard, I have the honour to be,

MY DEAR LORD,

Yours very sincerely,

R. BARCLAY-ALLARDICE.

URY, 5th January 1842.

PREFACE.

FROM habitual pursuits, the writer, in his
visit to the other side of the Atlantic, would
most probably have found his attention pe
culiarly attracted by agricultural matters.
But one of the principal objects of his visit,
having been to assist a near relative to deter
mine whether an intended purchase of land,
for a permanent residence, should be made in
the United States or in Upper Canada, he
was still the more particularly induced to en
quire into the situation of rural affairs in these
countries.

He accordingly investigated them with con
siderable care, and noted those more promi
nent and important points which appeared
sufficient to convey a general view of Trans
atlantic agriculture.

Till PREFACE.

In the following pages will be found record
ed, the facts he ascertained and the observa
tions they elicited ; and he will feel amply
gratified if the result of his labours, in this
respect, prove interesting to agriculturists at
home, or, if these pages reach the hands of
any of his Transatlantic friends, be deemed
worthy of their consideration.

An acquaintance with the soils and seasons
of a country, with its laws and customs, and
the habits and even the prejudices of its people,
more intimate and extensive than can be ac
quired by a stranger in a passing visit, may
be thought necessary to authorise and give
effect to the proposal of material changes in
the practice of its agriculture.

But such an observation admits of great
qualification : — For in the practical agricul
ture of a country, there may be defects which
are obvious at first sight to the agriculturist
of any other country, even where local circum
stances are of the utmost dissimilarity. But
when there is proposed, a comparison of the
rural economy of two countries, in which the

PREFACE. IX

same crops are cultivated, the same species of
stock reared, where the soils bear a near re
semblance, and the dissimilitude of climates is
not so great as to preclude a notion of their
distinct effects, it does not seem that the prac
tice of the one may not properly enough be
estimated by the practice of the other.

Such, in a great degree, are the circum
stances which attend a comparison of the agri
culture of the United States, with the agricul
ture of Britain, and therefore the writer did
not apprehend that he was guilty of any ano
maly, in an endeavour to measure the former
by the standards of the latter.

If he had entertained any doubt on this
point, it would have been removed by his
having, since his observations were committed
to writing, had an opportunity of perusing an
ably conducted American periodical, The New
Genesee Farmer, in which he finds the most
intelligent agriculturists in the States, hold
up British farming as a guide to their country
men.

Of this a sufficient example is furnished by

X PREFACE.

the following passage in a powerful address by
Mr Biddle, chairman of an agricultural meet
ing at Philadelphia. After enumerating the
many advantages possessed by the farmers of
Pennsylvania, he expresses himself in these
words : —

" Having thus spoken of the advantages
which we enjoy, I proceed to the less agree
able but more profitable enquiry, why our farms
are not so productive as they ought to be —
and I make the comparison between Penn
sylvania and England, because I think Eng
land, on the whole, the best farming country
in Europe ; and our English friends must un
derstand, that while we amuse ourselves occa
sionally with some of their peculiarities, * we
pay them the highest compliment we can, by
proposing them AS THE CONSTANT MODELS

OF OUR FARMING."

* Mr Biddle here, in some measure, compliments with
a banter, but does it very good naturedly, and it is pleas
ing to understand from him, that the Americans find the
means of giving the English, « a Rowland for their Oli
ver."

PREFACE. XI

This sufficiently corroborates the propriety
of the criterion by which the writer formed
his opinions of practical agriculture in the
United States.

But, as to a certain extent confirming these
opinions, it may be useful to notice that, in
his address, Mr Biddle goes on to enquire —
why it is that with all the natural advan
tages the farmers of Pennsylvania possess,
THE ENGLISH FARMER BEATS THEM ? — and
he ascribes this mainly, first to a want of taste
for agriculture as a profession, and secondly
to the Pennsylvania farmer not employing suf
ficiency of capital in his business.

Now these, it will be found, arc included
by the writer, among the causes to which he
imputes the imperfect condition of agriculture
in the United States, inasmuch as he has in
culcated the propriety of granting there, what
in this country are termed improving leases,
in order that thereby the expenditure of ca
pital may be encouraged and rendered safe,
and a race of farmers by education and profes
sion, may be established.

XII PREFACE.

It may also be observed that among the va
rious striking advantages possessed by the
American farmer, in spite of which the skill
of the British agriculturist triumphs, Mr Bid-
die instances the following : — that land which
in England could not be rented under ten or
twelve dollars an acre, may be rented in the
States at two or three dollars ; and that if on
an English farm of 200 acres, the rent and
charges would amount to 3000 dollars, the
same rent and charges would in the States, be
only 700 dollars, making in favour of the
American farm, a difference of 2300 dollars
per annum.

In his estimate, insofar as relates to an
English farm, Mr Biddle is no doubt below
the mark, but his local knowledge is sufficient
to warrant the accuracy of his statement in the
other case ; and thus it will appear, the
writer is supported to the full, in the opinion
he has promulgated, as to the increase in pro
ductiveness, which would be effected by the
introduction into the States, of the British
modes of farming ; and also as to the great ad-

PREFACE. Xlll

vantage which, consequently, the British agri
culturist intending to emigrate, would reap
from the employment of his capital and skill
in that country.

Having taken occasion to make a compari
son on the subject of emigration, between Up
per Canada and the United States, the writer
would here remark, that it may be supposed
any prepossessions he had on that subject, must
naturally have been on the side of a colony
belonging to his own country.

But, on examining the matter on the spot,
he found the difficulties and discouragements
which settlers of moderate capital encounter
in Upper Canada, are as yet so formidable,
and the advantages to persons of whatever
amount of capital, settling in the United
States, comparatively so great, that he was
called upon not to withhold the opinion he had
formed, but to contribute what that opinion
might be deemed worth, in preventing the se
rious disappointments which often is the lot
of agricultural emigrants to the former coun
try.

XIV PREFACE.

He does not conceive that a preference
given, by British emigrants, to the United
States, can prejudicially affect British interests.
He would rather imagine its tendency were
just the reverse ; as a good understanding be
tween the two countries, so vitally important
to both, must be promoted by infusing our su
perabundant population into the population of
the States.*

* This was written before the writer had an opportunity
of seeing " Buckingham's America," in which he finds a
similar opinion more fully and forcibly expressed, in the
following passage :

" If the surplus population of Britain, who cannot ob
tain adequate remuneration for their labour at home, could
but be prevailed upon to transport themselves at once to
this country, and seek for employment where it is best
found on their arrival ; it is impossible to estimate, to
their full extent, the benefits that would result to both
countries, but, above all, to the parties emigrating. Here,
millions of acres, now lying untouched, would be brought
into cultivation, and the wealth of the country increased,
while the spread of dwellings and population, the increase
of towns and cities, the opening of railroads and canals,
would send America a century forward in all that is de
sirable.

" In England the effect would be felt, first by a rise in

PREFACE. XV

If the writer is right in suggesting that pre
ference, it must, to those who coincide with
him, be satisfactory to find, what now appears,
that the tide of Transatlantic emigration has
of late been setting strongly in the direction
he recommends.

But whatever may be deemed best, with re
gard to the destination of British emigrants,
it is to be regretted that adequate measures
are not adopted by the government or the le
gislature, for encouraging and aiding emigra
tion, to an extent sufficient to obviate the dis
tress which an excess of population has creat
ed and is daily producing in this country.
And although, under existing circumstances,
Upper Canada does not certainly hold out to

the wages and an improvement of the condition of those
who remained at home ; next in the increased demand for
British manufactures, which the increased population of
America would create ; and, lastly, by the strengthening
of those ties of kindred and connection bettveen the peo
ple of the two countries, which would make all their
friendly relations stronger and stronger, and make fu
ture wars between them more and more difficult, if not
impossible" — Vol. ii. 416.

XVI PREFACE.

emigrants of capital, the advantages offered by
the States, it is not to be doubted, that by a
proper application of the means which the Bri
tish nation could afford, and ought in good
policy to devote to that purpose, such an im
provement of the rural condition of the pro
vince might be accomplished, as would induce
capitalists to settle there, and render it eligi
ble for emigrants of every class, and to any nu
merical amount.

It only remains to be said in this place, that
in referring by name to individuals with whom
he had the pleasure of communicating in the
course of his tour, the writer anxiously hopes
it will not be considered that he has been
guilty of any breach of courtesy.

He felt that the hospitality and kindness he
experienced throughout, called for particular
acknowledgement ; and, for the rest, he trusts
the great importance of the improvement of
agriculture generally, in the States, will be al
lowed to justify references to private practice,
where he found it illustrative of prevailing de
fects.

PREFACE. XV11

If, therefore, any good shall proceed from
his suggestions, he is persuaded the gentlemen
to whom he has alluded, will not grudge him
the liberty he has, for effecting it, taken with
their names.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

Departure from Liverpool — Gale — Mail Steamers
— Halifax — Aspect of the Town — Vicinity — Bay
— Departure from Halifax — Passengers from
Liverpool — Captain Cleland, . . Page 1

CHAPTER II.

Arrival at Boston — Town — Bunkershill — Vicinity
of Boston — Farms — R oads — Population — Man
ners of the People, ... 7

CHAPTER III.

Departure from Boston — Country to Stonnington —
New York — Haarlem — American mode of driving
in gigs — Long Island — Staten Island — Inatten
tion to husbandry — Cause of it — Field for enter
prising farmers — Domestic economy in New
York — Hospitality — Departure, . . 12

XX CONTENTS.

)
CHAPTER IV.

Sail up the Hudson — Red-Hook — Mr Henry Bar
clay's estate — System of farming followed there —
He now intends to grant improving leases — Ad
vantage of his locality — Voyage up the Hudson
continued — Arrival at Albany — Mr Southam —
His farm — His stock — Situation and population
of Albany — American hospitality — Episcopal
chapel — Observance of Sabbath and religious du
ties — Inspection of Mr Southam's stock — Mr
Renton's stock — Sheep — Soil round Albany —
Kentucky farmers — Their farming — Disadvan
tage of their distance from market — Their pur
chase of stock — Stock suitable for them, . 18

CHAPTER V.

Departure from Albany — Country to Utica — Fences
common in New York State — From Utica to Sy
racuse — Auburn — Departure for Canandaigua —
Description of American stage-coach — Geneva —
Arrival at Canandaigua — Mr Greig — Evening
at his house — Departure for Geneseo, . 28

CHAPTER VI.

Arrival at Geneseo — Mr Wordsworth — His exten
sive landed property — Colonel Wordsworth's farm
— His stock — His flock — No green crops —
Treatment of stock in winter — His rotation of
cr0ps — Remarks on his system — Mr Words
worth's tenantry — Aversion to granting leases —
Agricultural horses — American plough — Labour-

CONTENTS XXI

er's wages and hours — Col. Wordsworth's esta
blishment of "labourers — Genesee flats — Price of
land — Militia General, . . 36

CHAPTER VII.

Departure from Geneseo — Caledonia — Mr New-
bold's farm and stock — Thunderstorm — Mr
Macnaughton's farm — Instance of rapid rise in
price of land — Scotch families at Caledonia —
Arrived with small capital — Now independent, 51

CHAPTER VIII.

Departure from Caledonia — Batavia — Description
of an American Hotel — Lockport — Visit to Falls
of Niagara — Lewiston — Arrival at Toronto, Ca
pital of Upper Canada, . . .57

CHAPTER IX.

Population of Toronto — Streets and Buildings —
Mr A. Wood — Arrival at Hamilton — Difference
between people in Upper Canada and those in the
States — Features of the country — Cleared land —
Means of transport and markets wanting — Specu
lators in land — Favourable settlement for labour
ing people only — Expense of Cultivation — Visit
to Mr Ferguson at Woodhill — Meeting with the
Chief of Macnab — .Introduction to Sir Allan
Macnab — His treatment by Whig Government
— My purpose in visiting Upper Canada alluded
to — Temperature — Return to Toronto — Bishop
Strachan, 6 1

XX11 CONTENTS.

CHAPTER X.

Route to New York— Buffalo — Sail to Erie — De
parture by stage for Pittsburgh — The trials of
that conveyance — Comparison of old Scotch
roads — Wildness of country between Erie and
Pittsburgh — Crops — Indian corn — Stock — Dif
ficult ascents— Arrival at Pittsburgh, . Page 74

CHAPTER XI.

Pittsburgh — Ohio River — Iron founderies — Steam
boat machinery — Trade — Departure for Wheelin
— Country between Pittsburgh and Wheelin —
Arrival at Wheelin — Its communication with east
ern states — Departure for Frederick — Country
travelled over — Enter the Alleghanies — Cross
these mountains — Arrival at Haggerston — Wag
gons and horses — Weather — Frederick — Arrival
at Baltimore — The City — Visit to Mr Belzouver's
farm, . ... 80

CHAPTER XII.

Departure for Richmond — Washington — Sail up the
Potomac — Fredericksburgh — Arrival at Rich
mond — Condition of slaves in Virginia — Mr
Marx's farm — His mode of farming — Culture of
oats — Objections to his farming — Allowance of
seed — Mules used in agriculture — Improvements
suggested — To be partly adopted by Mr Marx —
Flour-mills — Cotton-mills — Departure from
Richmond — Arrival at Washington — Capitol —
House of Representatives and Senate — Introduc-

CONTENTS. XXlll

tion to the President — Mount Vernon — The resi
dence of Washington — His tomb — Return to
Washington, . . . Page 90

CHAPTER XIII.

Departure from Washington — Country between it
and Philadelphia — Arrival there — Head's Man
sion-House — Mr Cope — Drive with him to the
country — Visit to Mr SheafFs farm — Superiority
of his management — Crops secured in barns — Ob
jections to that mode — Excellence of his barns —
— Garden and orchards — His place for sale — Mr
and Mrs Tyson — Water-works — Penitentiary —
Girard's College — Chinese museum — Mr Cad-
wallader's fast-trotters — Secretary of Antiquarian
Society — Draft of Deed of Independence — De
parture from Philadelphia, . . 108

CHAPTER XIV.

Return to New York through East Jersey — Anni
versary of American Independence — Exemplary
behaviour of the assemblage — Jubilee suddenly
terminated by a terrific thunderstorm — Visit to
Glover Farm New Jersey — Departure from Nevr
York — Arrival at Boston — Dinner on board Bri
tannia Steamer, and presentation of plate to
Captain Cleland — Concluding observations on the
United States — Departure from Boston — Return
to Liverpool — Unprecedented rapidity of the
voyage, . . . . 129

APPENDIX.

Dinner to Captain Barclay of Ury, at Stonehaven, 161

AGRICULTURAL TOUR

IN THE

UNITED STATES AND UPPER CANADA.

CHAPTER I.

Departure from Liverpool — Gale — Mail Steamers —
Halifax — Aspect of the Town — Vicinity — Bay — De
parture from Halifax — Passengers from Liverpool —
Captain Cleland.

April 1841.

AT 11 A. M. of Tuesday the 20th of April
1841, I sailed from Liverpool in the Britan
nia Mail-steamer, for Halifax and Boston.
For the first two days of the voyage the wea
ther was favourable, but on the second after
noon, on our leaving Cape Clear and bidding
adieu to land, the wind changed right a-head,
with a very heavy sea, which continued with
out intermission until the following Wednesday
night.

2 GALE.

On Sunday the 25th, we encountered a
gale truly tremendous — the sea running moun
tains high, and frequently sweeping us from
stem to stern — in the course of which one of
the crew had his leg broken. The gallant
ship, however, rode bravely through it, rising
like a duck over the mountainous billows, and
submitting admirably to the direction of the
helm and the wonderful mechanism by which
she was propelled. The Mail-steamers, four
in number, are well adapted for crossing the
stormy Atlantic, being 235 feet in length, and
only about 30 feet wide, although from their
being narrow and light, carrying besides fuel,
nothing but passengers with their luggage,
and the Mail bags, they roll excessively in a
heavy sea.

The head- wind and sea continued with lit
tle abatement until we reached Halifax on the
morning of the 4th of May, where we remain
ed about eight hours.

I went on shore and walked through the
town and neighbourhood. It is a miserable
dirty place ; the houses all of wood, and

HALIFAX. 3

straggling in every direction ; the streets nar
row and a foot deep in mud ; the lower class
of the inhabitants, particularly the black po
pulation, in their appearance squalid and po
verty struck, and the horses very wretched
animals.

Nova Scotia, of which Halifax is the ca
pital, has been a colony of Great Britain
for about eighty years. Considerable atten
tion has been paid during that time to its
improvement in agriculture, chiefly under the
auspices of societies instituted for that laudable
purpose, but a rugged and generally unpro
ductive soil has proved a great obstacle, and
I could see that coastwards but little impres
sion has been made in overcoming its na
tural poverty. As far as the eye could car
ry me, the country appeared rocky, bare,
and sterile ; the timber trees all cut down,
and only dwarf firs remaining ; and the land
upon the whole much resembling the bleakest
parts of the east coast of Scotland, to a resem
blance to which the country may well owe its
name.

4 HALIFAX.

I was amused with the local partiality of
some of the principal inhabitants, which led
them to endeavour to persuade me, that, poor
as it seemed to me, the country was really a
fine one, and some of them even went the
length of assuring me, the land would carry
100 bushels or 12 \ quarters of oats per acre !

The bay is beautiful, capable of containing
the whole British navy, and the fort very
strong ; and it will be recollected that it was
to Halifax the British troops, and with them
several thousand of the Royalist inhabitants,
retired when obliged to evacuate Boston on
its bombardment by General Washington in
1776.

We took our departure from Halifax about
1 P. M. of the 4th, having there left two-thirds
of our passengers, who were bound for Quebec,
St John's, and Montreal.

I may here observe, that we had 90 pas
sengers in the Britannia, from Liverpool. The
passage-money is L. 41, and no steerage pas
sengers are allowed. This, of course, makes
the company select, and accordingly I never

CAPTAIN CLELAND.

before met as numerous a company, strangers
to each other, so agreeable and anxious to
make things mutually pleasant — there was in
feet not a single black sheep on board.

Of the captain, Cleland, I can hardly speak
in terms of sufficient commendation. His
tact, and anxiety to make himself acceptable
to every individual, without losing sight of his
proper position as commander, was the theme
of general praise. For myself, I shall always
retain a sense of his kindness : — It happened
that I went on board at Liverpool a total
stranger to every one, and consequently felt
alone and somewhat uncomfortable. Observ
ing this, the captain made up to me, and in
vited me to his cabin, and having there in the
course of conversation, learnt my name, he
asked if I was " the celebrated Captain Bar
clay ?" To this I pleaded guilty ; it was
soon circulated from right to left, and in the
course of a very short time I knew almost
every body, or at any rate almost every body
knew me.

Notwithstanding the boisterous weather we

6 SEASONING.

encountered, the constant crashing of plates,
glasses, and other moveable articles, and the
crowded state of the ship, I after three or four
days became seasoned, and the time passed
quickly and lightly.

ARRIVAL AT BOSTON.

CHAPTER II.

Arrival at Boston — Town — Bunkershill — Vicinity of
Boston — Farms — Roads — Population — Manners of
the People.

May 184 L

WE had a pleasant run, of about thirty-
seven hours, from Halifax to Boston, the ca
pital of Massachusetts, the distance about 380
miles. We arrived in the harbour at 2 A. M.
of the 6th, thus having made the voyage
from Liverpool in fourteen days to Halifax,
and fifteen days and a half to Boston. With
the same weather, in a sailing vessel, we
should probably have been six weeks on the
passage.

At 6 A. M. I went on shore, heartily glad
to find myself once more on terra firma. I
took up my quarters at the Albion Hotel, a
very comfortable house — went into a cold

5 BOSTON.

bath — ate a good breakfast — and then walk
ed through the town, which is much to be
admired.

The houses are all of brick or stone, and
particularly handsome ; the streets regular and
clean, paved with wooden blocks, and having
foot-paths about six feet wide, laid with brick,
and everything proclaiming Boston to be a
place of importance. The population, I under
stood, is now upwards of 100,000, having in
creased more than five-fold within the last
eight-and-forty years.

From the quantity of well-fed beef and
mutton I saw in the butchers' market, I in
ferred that the land about Boston must be
good, and feeding well understood. The fish
and poultry markets were also excellent, and,
in short, there appeared to be in Boston no
want of the good things of this world.

On Friday the 7th, I drove eight or ten
miles into the country, and visited Bunkers-
hill where a monument, designed to be 280
feet high, is erecting of granite, to commemo
rate the battle fought there in the beginning

FARMS.

of the war of independence. The country
through which I passed, and as far beyond as
the eye could reach, was extremely fine, studded
with farm-houses built of wood, roofed with
blue shingles in the form of slates, and gaily
whitened. These houses, I was told, will last
150 years.

The farms seldom exceed from 100 to 300
acres, and they are all occupied by the pro
prietors. The fields are small, and enclosed
with rude stone dikes. From the opportuni
ty I had I could not well judge of the quality
of the soil, but the grass lands were evidently
only recovering from the effects of a severe
winter, and vegetation seemed more backward
than in Britain.

I could not discover any appearance of a re
gular system of farming. The implements of
husbandry were clumsy and uncouth. Oxen,
seemingly of the large red Sussex breed, ap
peared to be chiefly used in agriculture, but
from the lateness of the season and the want
of keep, no stock was to be seen in the fields.
In Boston they have an active well-bred sort

10 ROADS.

of horse, chiefly used in buggies, which I was
told is reared in New England, and fetches
a price as high as forty or fifty guineas. I
was assured the proprietor of a farm of the size
I have noticed, lives in a comfortable style,
equal to that of a Scotch laird of from L. 500
to L. 1000 a-year, and, from the appearance of
the dwellings, I had no doubt of it.

No attention is paid to the roads, which are
full of holes sufficient to shake any sort of car
riage to pieces. There are no turnpikes nor
any fund for maintaining the roads. This, it
is obvious, must operate as a great drag in the
business of agriculture, and one is surprised to
find an enlightened people like that of Massa
chusetts, not more alive to the fact that the
value of land is incalculably enhanced by good
roads of internal communication.*

* It should not, however, be forgotten, that, fifty
years ago, the roads in Scotland were generally not in a
much better condition than those in Massachusetts.
Within that period the rent of land has greatly increased,
being now, in most instances, more than three times the
former amount. This is due, in a great measure, to the
improvement of the land, consequent on the opening of

MANNERS. 11

Within a circuit of twenty miles round Bos
ton, the population, comprised in towns, vil
lages, and numberless farm-houses, is extreme
ly dense, and, including that of Boston itself, is
said to exceed 200,000, forming altogether, an
intelligent, enterprising, and thriving people.

It was here I began to observe that very
distorted descriptions of American manners are
indulged in by some of our travellers. I am
not sure that in that matter a comparison would
be favourable, generally speaking, to my own
country ; — at all events, I can with truth say
that I met with much polite attention in Bos
ton, and regretted it was not in my power to
prolong my stay there.

new roads and the melioration of the old ones, the farmer
in Scotland being now accommodated in respect of roads,
better perhaps than his brethren in any other part of the
United Kingdom.

12 DEPARTURE FROM BOSTON.

CHAPTER III.

Departure from Boston — Country to Stonington— New
York—Haarlem — American mode of driving in gigs
— Long Island — Staten Island — Inattention to hus
bandry — .Cause of it — Field for enterprising farmers —
Domestic economy in New York — Hospitality — De
parture.

May 1841.

AT 4 P. M. of the 8th of May I left Bos
ton for New York, proceeding first by the rail
way to Stonington in Connecticut, and thence
in the steam-boat to New York, where I ar
rived at 6 o'clock the following morning, the
whole distance being about 250 miles.

The country through which we passed to
Stonington is, near the railway, low and
marshy ; higher up it is rough and stony, and
covered with copse and young pines, the tim
ber trees having evidently been all cut down

NEW YORK. 13

for use. This was invariably the feature of
the country, with here and there a patch of
fifty or sixty acres taken in from the woods
and improved. The fields are small, poor in
soil, and enclosed with rough stone dikes.
After quitting the railway I had not an op
portunity of seeing the country between Ston-
ington and New York.

I now found myself in a magnificent city
containing about 300,000 inhabitants — the
streets spacious, particularly the foot-paths,
which appear to be double the width of those
even in the more modern parts of London —
the Broadway, three miles in length, and
many of the other streets one and two miles.
All is activity and bustle, and here, with the En
glish language in his ears, and a general En
glish appearance in his view, one may easily
fancy himself in London.

The streets are quite as much crowded
as those in London with foot-passengers ;
and the shops are large and elegant, but there
is not the same crowd of carriages, waggons,
carts, or other vehicles, and there are but few

14 HAARLEM.

gentlemen's carriages to be seen. But agri
cultural matters being the more immediate ob
jects of my attention, I abstain from at
tempting any particular description of New
York, which, indeed, is too well known to
render such an endeavour on my part ne
cessary.

In the afternoon I drove out with my friend
Mr George Barclay to Haarlem, distant from
New York nine miles, — the intervening space
being, however, one continued street. I was
much amused with the number of gigs and
buggies on the road, all with fast trotters in
strong competition, and some of them going a
tremendous pace. They are driven with a
straight iron bit, on which the horse lays all
his weight, the charioteer holding a rein in
each hand with an immense strain on his arms,
totally opposed to our system, and, I should
think, to comfort.

On the llth of May I crossed over to Long
Island where I walked several hours. This
island is 160 miles long and 18 broad. It is
the garden of New York, rich in soil, highly

3

STATEN ISLAND. 15

cultivated, picturesquely diversified with hill
and dale, and covered with villages, villas, and
farm-houses ; but I could not discover that
the land is under any regular system of agri
culture, or that, with all the advantages it pos
sesses, in the quality of soil and proximity to
the New York market, any effort is used to
make the most of them.

Next day I crossed over to Staten Island,
distant from New York nine miles. This
island, about forty miles in circumference, is
like Long Island, beautiful and picturesque.
I drove over a considerable part of it, and
found large tracts of rich meadow land applied
to comparatively little profitable use. They
mow a considerable part of the meadows, but
I saw very little stock — no sheep — and such cat
tle as were to be seen were of the most hetero
geneous breeds, bad Lancashires, Scotch, and
Welsh, no two bearing the least appearance of
consanguinity. Wheat and Indian corn are
grown in small patches. The farming imple
ments are of a rude and awkward description ;
and, in a word, here is a fine tract of land which*

16 AGRICULTURE.

as regards the matter of agriculture, is almost
neglected.

The cause of this neglect is obvious : — In
the neighbourhood of New York, in Long
Island, and also in Staten Island, the land
is occupied chiefly by mercantile people. Com
merce engrosses their time and attention, and
agriculture is with them of secondary conside
ration, seemingly as little understood as cared
for. Much, therefore, might be done here by
enterprising men, capable of introducing and
keeping up a proper breed of stock, and re
solved as well as qualified to follow a British
system of agriculture. Or, as these Islands
command the New York market, much of the
land might be turned to great account by con
verting it into market gardens for the supply
of that city. But in this case, and perhaps
in both, it would be necessary to bring from
Britain skilful hands and suitable implements.
In both Islands there is an ample supply of
stone and timber.

In quitting New York, I feel it incumbent
on me to observe, that in every family I visit-

HOSPITALITY. 17

ed, I found the same comforts and correct
domestic economy as in the first families in
Britain — their servants equally respectful and
well bred, and certainly void of any approach
to that vulgarity and improper freedom with
accounts of which some travellers amuse their
readers.

My acknowledgements for great kindness
and hospitality are due to my relatives Messrs
George and Anthony Barclay, as well as to
Friend Mott and his delightful family circle, in
all of whom I found friends indeed. From
the Messrs Barclay I obtained useful infor
mation as to the state of the country and my
future progress ; and on the 14th of May I
bade adieu for a time to New York.

18 HUDSON.

CHAPTER IV.

Sail up the Hudson — Red-Hook — -Mr Henry Barclay's
estate — System of farming followed there — He now
intends to grant improving leases — Advantage of his
locality — Voyage up the Hudson continued — Arrival
at Albany — Mr Southam — His farm — His stock —
Situation and population of Albany — American hos
pitality Episcopal chapel — Observance of Sabbath

and religious duties — Inspection of Mr Southam's
stock Mr Renton's stock — Sheep — Soil round Al
bany Kentucky farmers — Their farming — Disad
vantage of their distance from market — Their pur
chase of stock — Stock suitable for them.

May 1841.

FROM New York I enjoyed the great beauty
of the sail up the Hudson, 116 miles, to Red-
Hook. We passed what is styled the High
lands, a bold picturesque and rocky shore,
winding through mountains covered with wood,
and having beyond them a rich cultivated
country extending far into the interior.

RED-HOOK. 19

From Red- Hook I crossed over to the re
sidence of Mr Henry Barclay who has pur
chased a considerable estate on the opposite
shore, and named it Ury. I was kindly re
ceived by Mr Barclay, who has resided fifteen
years at Ury, where he has founded a town,
now containing 2000 inhabitants, erected paper
and cotton mills, and altogether laid out a large
sum which he informs me is making him a
handsome return.

His residence is about six miles from the
Catskill mountains, a range in form not unlike
the Grampians, though more stupendous, and
for the most part covered with pine trees and
huge rocks. He says a country lies between
him and the Catskill range, which is well cul
tivated. But on his own estate I observed
the same objectionable system of agriculture
I have already noticed ; — no attention is paid
to stock, and no leases are granted, the tenants
holding from year to year, and being allowed
to crop the land as they choose. He is now,
however, quite aware of the advantages he
would derive from an enterprising tenantry

20 HUDSON.

conversant with a proper mode of husbandry,
and would willingly grant to persons of that
description favourable leases for a term of
years ; and, as his estate is situate within seven
hours sail of the New York market, a grand
field is here laid open for agricultural emigrants
from Britain.

On the 15th, about 2 p. M. I resumed my
voyage up the Hudson, in the steamer for
Albany, distant fifty miles. The shore on
both sides continues bold and rocky, but be
yond, as far as the eye can reach, it travels
over a country rich in enclosed fields, woods,
and villas.

Ariving at Albany at 6 o'clock, I was met
' on board by a Mr Southam from Oxfordshire,
who has been in the country three or four
years, and occupies a farm of 300 acres about
ninety miles from Albany, which, lying quite
out of my route, I was not able to visit, and
this I the less regretted as I understood it is
still in a very rough state, and does not yet
fully exhibit the effects of subjection to the
English mode of management. Mr Southam

ALBANY. 21

has been a large importer of Durham and
Hereford cattle, particularly the latter, which
he considers better adapted for this country,
although on this point I have difficulty in coin
ciding with him.

Albany, a neat clean town, containing
about 30,000 inhabitants, is pleasantly situate
on the banks of the Hudson, and commands, on
both sides of the river, an extensive view over
a fertile country interspersed with thriving
towns and villages.

The hospitality of America, to which I can
not too often allude, was here again experien
ced by me in several of the first families in the
place, particularly in those of Mr Rhodes and
Mr Corner, the latter of whom had been my
fellow-passenger in the Britannia. These
gentlemen are both engaged in trade, and no
thing could exceed the comforts of their houses
and establishments.

On Sunday the 16th I attended an Episco
pal place of worship — neatly fitted up and
commodious — as much so as most churches in
London ; the service much the same as in the

22 FARMING-STOCK.

Established English church, the sermon excel
lent, and the congregation of respectable ap
pearance. From the little I had seen, and
all I had heard, it appeared that here and
elsewhere the people in America are correct
observers of the Sabbath and attentive to the
duties of religion. In Albany there is also a
Presbyterian church, and several others of dif
ferent persuasions.

Next day, I inspected Mr Southam's im
ported stock which, his farm not being in a fit
state to receive them, he keeps within three
miles of Albany. I accordingly saw a herd of
about twenty Hereford cows, all tied up, and
in fair condition ; one very superior three
years old Durham heifer ; and some good
Berkshire pigs. The Herefords seemed very
good, but I do not pretend to much know
ledge of that breed.

I also visited a neighbouring gentleman, a
Mr Prentice, who has a herd of about twenty
Durham cows, which, for the most part, he
had imported, and also three Durham bulls.
His cows were tolerable, but he decidedly

SOIL. 23

had not gone to the fountain head for his bulls,
as one of them was a coarse ungainly animal,
and the other two evidently spurious.

Hitherto, I had not had an opportunity of
seeing any sheep. I now saw a small flock of
Merino ewes belonging to Mr Southam, which
he proposes to cross with the Cotswold. The
Merinos are ugly unsightly animals, but I
was told they are universally preferred through
out the States.

Round Albany, the soil is sandy and poor,
requiring much manure to make it productive.
I could not discover that any better system of
agriculture was followed here, than I had ob
served in other places.

I here met with two Kentucky farmers, with
whom I had a good deal of conversation re
garding the objects of my enquiry. They
mentioned that their soil is of the richest de
scription — that they can, without manure,
raise wheat and Indian corn, crop after crop,
ad injinitum, but, being 1000 miles from mar
kets, chiefly overland, grain, beyond what is
required for their own consumpt, is to them

CATTLE.

nearly valueless, so much so, that they drive
large herds of cattle into their fine fields of
Indian corn, to feed upon it and beat it down
as they may ; after which the land is ploughed
for a wheat crop.

In these circumstances, the Kentucky far
mers confine their attention chiefly to grazing
cattle, and for this purpose have adopted the
Durham breed ; but having, after they are fed,
to drive them so great a distance as 1000
miles to market, they find the cattle of that
heavy breed reduced to mere shadows at the end
of their journey ; consequently, the animals
which leave Kentucky perfectly fat, must, when
they reach New York, be sold as lean stock,
and that, probably, of the worst description.

The farmers of Kentucky, therefore, now
think of changing to a breed of cattle that will
carry their beef along with them, and this qua
lity they expect to find in the Herefords. With
that impression, they gave Mr Southam a
price equal to 100 guineas for one of his cows,
and, by the by, at the same time, paid him
as much as sixty guineas for a Berkshire sow.

BLACK-CATTLE. £5

I fear they will find themselves mistaken and
disappointed in the Herefords, and I am con
vinced that in their circumstances they would
reap greater advantage by importing Angus or
Aberdeenshire Doddies, which are kindred
breeds of well-formed, moderate-sized, active
animals — or perhaps still better, the small
and peculiarly symmetrical West- Highland cow
•*— and to cross these with a short-horn or Dur
ham bull.

The West-Highlander possesses all the points
of a good feeder, and being hardy and active
as a deer, would suffer little from being driven
even 1000 miles. In its native glens it may
feed to twenty or twenty-five stones Amster
dam, but the heifers on being transplanted to
a rich and sheltered pasture attain to nearly
double that weight. I have proved this by
introducing a herd of forty West- Highland
heifers on my own farm at Ury, (not the
American Ury)y where they have been crossed
with my short-horn bulls, and the experiment
on repeated trials has been attended with great
success ; for while the mothers by removal to a

2O BREEDING STOCK.

more nutritious pasture have greatly increased
in size, the cross has produced strong and
handsome animals, kindly feeders, rising to a
great weight and fetching high prices.

The Kentucky grazier, occupying pastures
of the richest kind and enjoying mild winters,
would I think be well-advised in adopting
the same plan, — of course observing that if it
can be avoided, the produce of the cross
should not be bred from, it being well-known
that the progeny of hybrids turn out to be
coarse and unprofitable stock. There is no
reason to doubt that such a cross would carry
their beef along with them, from Kentucky
to New York, in the same way that, before
steam navigation was invented, fat cattle were
often driven from Scotland to London, a dis
tance of 500 or 600 miles, with no perceptible
loss of weight or condition.*

* In corroboration of the advice given in the text, to

the Kentucky farmer, and also as affording a proof of the

advantage to be derived from attention to the breeding

of stock generally, the writer hopes he may be excused

.for referring to the following notice taken by the news-

BREEDING STOCK.

papers, of his annual sale of stock in October 1841 :
" Captain Barclay of Ury's annual sale of pure short
horn bull calves, — half-bred yearling heifers and steers,
a cross between a short-horn bull and pure Argyleshire
cows — and pure bred Leicester sheep, came off on the 7th
instant, and was, as usual, numerously and respectably
attended. The sale commenced with the short-horn bull
calves, and after a spirited bidding, the first was knocked
down at seventy-five guineas, the price of the others rang
ing from thirty to fifty guineas, and the average price of
the whol^ being about L.45 a piece. There was also
a keen competition for the yearling half-bred steers and
heifers, which brought an average price of about L. 12 a
head. After the sale, the captain entertained his friends
at dinner, and the evening was spent in a very happy
manner. The average (of the bull calves) this year is
three guineas a head higher than any former year."

With the same view, and not without a feeling of he
trusts pardonable pride and satisfaction, he would refer to
the newspaper report of a public dinner to which, on a
late occasion, his neighbours and friends did him the ho
nour to invite him, in compliment to his exertions in the
cause of agriculture ; and, as the report is too long to be
inserted in a note, it is given as an appendix to this pub
lication.

£8 DEPARTURE FROM ALBANY.

CHAPTER V.

Departure from Albany — Country to Utica — Fences
common in New York State — From Utica to Syra
cuse — Auburn — Departure for Canandaigua — De
scription of American stage-coach — Geneva — Arrival
at Canandaigua — Mr Greig — Evening at his house —
Departure for Geneseo.

May 1841.

ON the 18th, I left Albany by the railway
for Auburn distant about 200 miles. For
about twenty miles from the former place, the
soil is light and sandy ; after that it improves
to Utica, exhibiting the same rich appearance
I had before remarked. The fields seem well
cleared and are all enclosed, bearing crops of
wheat, Indian corn and clovers, or lying in
pastures ; but still there is an absence of those
improved modes of agricultural practice for
which the soil and climate are so well adapted

UTICA. 29

and which would so greatly conduce to the far
mer's advantage.

As far as I had yet travelled, and as I un
derstand throughout the state of New York,
no hedges are to be seen. Here enclosures
are rudely formed with what in the eyes of
a native of Britain seems a waste of timber ;
log is piled over log to the height of seven or
eight feet, and a fence thus formed I am told
lasts about ten years.

From Utica to Syracuse the railway tra
verses forests of gigantic oak, elm, sugar-maple,
and other kinds of timber. Great exertions
appear to be making to clear the land, the
railway having opened up these immense fo
rests to agricultural enterprise*

At Auburn, a very pretty town, I remain
ed all night, and left it by the stage next
morning for Canandaigua, a journey of forty
miles. This was the first trial I had had of
an American stage-coach, and I sincerely hope
it may be the last, until the means of con
ducting them with the infliction of less torture
on passengers be devised, as certainly a more

30 STAGE-COACH.

abominable conveyance than this vehicle, or
roads more abominable than those it was
dragged over, can hardly be imagined.

The American stage-coach is a most un
gainly vehicle, carrying nine insides, three on
a front seat, three on a back seat, and three
on a bench hung in the middle ; instead of
panels, it has oil-skin curtains to shut down
at night ; its body is something in the form
of a boat, resting on strong leather slings in
stead of steel springs, which indeed would
not stand a mile on their roads ; it conse
quently dances in the air like a balloon,
giving a certain kind of variety to the mo
notony of a journey. The coachman sits
on a bench, considerably lower than the
top of the coach, and lower even than the
horses, and there being no pad-terrets the reins
dangle loose and afford no command of the
horses ; but then they are so admirably broken
that, although fine high-spirited animals, they
regulate their pace instantly at his call. Each
man drives a twelve or fifteen mile stage, and
what much surprised me, pulls up every four

STAGE-COACH. 31

or five miles and gives his horses an ad libitum
dose of water. Including the long delays in
changing horses, dining, breakfasting, &c. the
average speed does not exceed four miles an
hour. The coachees are paid by the proprie
tors at the rate of twelve dollars per month
and receive no fee from passengers ; and this
latter is the rule also with all public servants
in the States, as in hotels, steam-boats, and
railways.

My anticipations, it may be supposed, were
none of the most pleasurable, when in one of
the vehicles I have endeavoured to describe,
I found myself placed beside eight large men
and a child. For a time I submitted to
threatened suffocation added to the risk of dis
located joints, but soon finding my position
no longer endurable I tried what effect the
offer of a fee would have in inducing the Ame
rican coachee to favour me with a seat be
side himself ; for outsiders, no doubt from a re
gard for people's bones, are not here encouraged.
A fee had the same virtue with him as it has
in such quarters in other parts of the world,

GENEVA.

and accordingly I mounted the bench, beside
the driver whom I found of an injocose and
taciturn class, thankful enough for information
as to foreign modes but not themselves of a
communicative turn.

I still however underwent a course of ex
cruciating jolting, and was exposed to conti
nual danger of dislocation of my joints, or of
being pitched off ; but I enjoyed the free air of
Heaven, and what to me was for the time of
more importance, a fall view of the country
than which nothing can be imagined more
beautiful. Composed of alternating hill and
dale it strongly reminded me of the most ad
mired parts of Northamptonshire ; but al
though all cleared and enclosed, the land evi
dently is mismanaged and much of its intrinsic
value thereby lost.

We changed horses at Geneva, twenty- three
miles from Auburn and delightfully situate on
the lake of that name, forty miles in length and
three in breadth. It is surrounded by a country
possessing that indescribable beauty and ricft-

CANANDAIGUA. 33

ness which characterize the finest districts of
this part of America.

Continuing our progress through the same
description of country, I arrived about six
o'clock at Canandaigua.

Forty or fifty years ago Mr Greig, a Scots
man, came over to manage the great Pultney
estates in this neighbourhood. He is now
himself a man of large fortune and an exten
sive land-owner, living at Canandaigua in a
mansion truly magnificent as well in external
appearance as in what relates to interior fur
nishing and decoration; and what is better,
the owner is universally respected as one in
whom great benevolence, the most generous
sentiments, and perfect integrity are combined
with an excellent judgment.

To this gentleman I had a letter of intro
duction from my friend George Barclay of
New York, which I having sent up, Mr Greig
in a short time came himself in his phaeton to

take me to his house. I saw at once that he

•

was all that had been represented to me, his
countenance beaming with kindness and intel-

MR GREIG.

ligence, and which to me was not a little in
teresting, he retains to this day his native ac
cent in all its purity, which, I confess, sound
ed sweetly to my ear in this land of strangers.

Unfortunately for me, Mr Greig who has
this year been elected a member to Congress
for his own district, had fixed to-morrow for
his departure for Washington, so that his time
was greatly occupied and I was deprived of an
opportunity of acquiring much information
which I expected to receive from him. Still
I had some interesting conversation with him
regarding his locality, in the course of which
I learnt that forty years ago the whole of the
surrounding country for hundreds of miles,
was one impenetrable forest, and that then not
a stone existed of the town of Canandaigua
now containing several thousand wealthy in
habitants.

Several of Mr Greig's neighbours were as
sembled at his house, whom I had the pleasure
of meeting, and among them a Mr Renton
an Ayrshire man who had settled near this
seven years ago. Upon the whole I passed a

GENESEO. 35

most agreeable evening at Mr Greig's, where
everything bore the marks of affluence, ele
gance and comfort.

Next morning I breakfasted at Mr Ren-
ton's and there experienced the frank hospita
lity of the country. Being as it seemed no
farmer, he makes the most of his land by sel
ling small allotments for building.

Having as I felt had quite enough of an
American stage-coach, I hired a phaeton to
convey me to Geneseo, distant thirty miles,
and accordingly about three o'clock p. M. I
left Canandaigua.

36 GENESEO.

CHAPTER VI.

Arrival at Geneseo — Mr Wordsworth — His extensive
landed property — Colonel Wordsworth's farm — His
stock — His flock — No green crops — Treatment of
stock in winter — His rotation of crops — Remarks on
his system — Mr Wordsworth's tenantry — Aversion to
granting leases — Agricultural horses — American
plough — Labourer's wages and hours — Col. Words
worth's establishment of labourers — Geneseo flats —
Price of land — Militia General.

May 1841.

I arrived at Geneseo about nine o'clock in
the evening of the 20th, having found the
country as I came along, a continuation of the
enchanting scenery I had previously passed
through.

Next morning I called on Mr Words^
worth, one of the largest if not the most ex
tensive land-owner in the State of New York,

COL. WORDSWORTH. 37

to whom I had brought a letter of introduc
tion. He lives in a fine house exactly resem
bling that of an English squire, picturesquely
situate on a rising ground and commanding
views similar in character and not excelled in
beauty by the prospects from Richmond Hill
or Windsor Castle. His family consists of
two sons and a daughter, one of the former
married and residing about a mile off; the
other son and the young lady living with their
father.

When I called the family were from home,
but in a few hours Colonel Wordsworth, the
younger son, visited me and in a most open
and kind manner pressingly invited me to
take up my residence at his father's house, an
invitation which I accepted.

I found the elder Mr Wordsworth the very
beau ideal of a fine old English country gen
tleman ; tall and graceful in person, and in
manners courteous, affable, and hospitable. In
all the young ladies of the States, to whom it
had hitherto been my good fortune to be in
troduced, I had remarked an amiable complai-

38 COL. WORDSWORTH.

sance which I regret to say a stranger rarely
meets with on a first introduction to my fair
countrywomen, who in their reception of stran
gers, are from education and habit apt to as
sume a false and repulsive dignity, while an
American lady on a similar occasion displays,
with high polish, a frankness and cordiality
extremely grateful to one's feelings and lead
ing him at once to fancy himself among old
friends. Such on my introduction to Miss
Wordsworth, were the qualities I found her in
an eminent degree to possess, and with them
uniting great beauty and accomplishment.

Mr Wordsworth's property comprises about
forty miles of country, the richness and pic
turesque appearance of which it is impossible
in adequate terms to describe. Of this pro
perty Colonel Wordsworth occupies 1600
acres, 1000 of which, in the Gene see flats, are
alluvial meadow land equal to any in the vales
of Aylesbury and Buckingham. This portion
of land he keeps in old pasture, laid out in
divisions of from 60 to* 100 acres each. The

FARM-STOCK. 3Q

remainder of the farm is upland and under a
rotation of crops, affording the first specimen
of anything approaching to systematic hus
bandry I had seen since I entered the States.

His stock comprehends 400 cattle, steers,
heifers and bulls, and about 2000 sheep of
the Merino breed, and I could not but regret
seeing land so valuable covered with stock of
so inferior a description.

The red breed of cattle which I had seen
all over the State of New York, Colonel
Wordsworth informs me are considered to be
Devons. If so they are much degenerated,
being of diminutive size, coarse, and evidently
bad feeders, averaging not more than from 25
to 30 stones.

Colonel Wordsworth's young stock are part
ly bred by himself or bought in at one year
old for about 25s. a head ; they seem starved
and stunted in their growth, and as miserable
in appearance as the worst stock on the bleak
sides of our Grampian hills, and yet were de
pasturing land of a quality equal to what with

40 GREEN CROPS.

us in Scotland might bring a rent of L. 5 per
acre.

He has two or three Durham bulls for cros
sing, but they are so low in condition and so
disfigured — appearing as if scalded with hot
water — that it is impossible to judge of their
properties. He also crosses with half-bred
bulls, and the consequence is a heterogeneous
mixture which it would puzzle a Wetherell to
analyse.

His system is to sell his cattle in the fall,
when they are three or four years old, at the
New York market distant 300 miles, where
they fetch a price equal to L. 8 or L. 10 a
head.

He raises no green crops, with the excep
tion of a few acres of potatoes and mangel
wurzel. Turnips he says cannot be raised
with them, being all cut off with the fly ; but
to the cultivation of that valuable root I could
discover here no physical impediment which
might not be overcome by skilful management.

He mows annually about 500 acres of his
meadow land, and the hay made from it is the

SHEEP. 41

sole dependence of his stock throughout the
winter. But his farm buildings are not at all
adequate to the requirements of such a farm,
and his stock in winter is foddered in the
open fields, where the animals must well nigh
starve, there being neither hedge nor shelter
of any kind to mitigate the severity of the
cold. This practice, in which the Colonel is
not singular, but which on the contrary is a
very general one, may well account for their
miserable appearance, as it is not easy other
wise to explain why cattle fed on good mea
dow hay, should at the end of winter be found
in such a condition ; and this too happens in
a country where timber is a drug, and hovels
might be run up in every direction at little
expense.

His flock as mentioned are all Merinos, or
are so styled, and their value consists chiefly
in their wool, little account being had of the
carcase which at three or four years old brings
only from 8s. to 10s. The weight of fleece
is 3 Ib. which sells at 2s. of our money per
pound, each sheep thus yielding for wool 6s.

per annum.

D

DAIRY.

Colonel Wordsworth has also a dairy of sixty
cows which he lets out to a tenant who ma
nages the establishment, making the cheese
and butter and paying to the Colonel 20s. for
each cow, besides a proportion of the produce
in kind. It need hardly be remarked that
the quantity of milk yielded by a cow left night
and day to shiver in the open air in the rigour
of an American winter, must be very trifling,
not certainly one-third of what she might give
under proper shelter.

The rotation of crops followed on the arable
farm are wheat and clover alternately — that is,
wheat is sown in autumn, and amongst it
clover is sown in spring ; the clover remains
until the second summer, neither mowed nor
pastured, but ploughed in for manure and
then wheat is again sown in autumn. This is
the only manuring the land receives ; for as
the cattle are all foddered in winter on the
meadow, the straw is either burnt, or piled up
in large masses to rot and waste under the in
fluence of the weather.
That this is a most improvident mode of

ROTATION OF CROPS. 43

agriculture, will at once occur to every person
acquainted with the principles of good farm
ing ; indeed it must create infinite surprise
that the advantages to be found in a right
system of convertible husbandry, should at this
time of day be as a terra incognita to the
otherwise enterprising American cultivator ;
for it is proper to observe that in describing
Colonel Wordsworth's practice, I relate what
takes place generally over the States.

Were Colonel Wordsworth to alter his mode
only so far as to provide the means of consum
ing his straw by foddering in the yard in win
ter, and his clover by soiling with it in sum
mer, his cattle might be brought to double
their present value at the time he sends them
to market ; and his land being manured with
a due allowance of farm-yard-dung thus ob
tained, might carry nearly double the crop of
wheat it now produces, which notwithstanding
the great natural fertility of the soil averages
only from twenty-five to thirty bushels an
acre.

44 TENANTRY,

Mr Wordsworth has a numerous tenantry,
but under a tenure which can yield neither
profit to the landlord nor benefit to themselves;
they have no leases, but plough and sow from
year to year, the landlord receiving for rent a
portion of the produce in kind. His portion
is ascertained on the field after the crop is
reaped, and is delivered by the tenants at an
appointed barn where it is instantly thrashed
out and the straw given to the winds.

Such a system must be a bar to every im
provement ; it in fact operates as a prohibi
tion of all exertion and expenditure by the te
nant for encreasing the fertility of his farm, it
being unreasonable to expect that any tenant
will use exertions or lay out capital, where the
landlord is to reap, certainly a large share of
the benefit thence accruing, and from the
precariousness of the tenure perhaps the whole.
Mr Wordsworth therefore may go on to draw
his share of the pittance of grain which his te
nants may under present circumstances be
able or disposed to raise, but he must lay his
account that in these circumstances nothing

TENANTRY. 45

can be done by them to improve the soil and
render it duly productive.

In agricultural business it is well known
there are two extremes ; at the one extreme
is placed the reckless speculator who catches
at every new theory however visionary ; at
the other, he with whom a sufficient reason
for avoiding every improvement however much
recommended by experience, is just that it is
an interference with old rules and habits.
Now, although Mr Wordsworth is an acute
well informed man who must have seen well
and far before him, having at an early period
made an extensive purchase of land at a price
greatly under the value to which time and cir
cumstances have raised it, yet it appears to
me he is much wedded to old customs, other
wise he would at once perceive the advantage
of dividing his estate into farms of a proper
size, erecting on them suitable buildings, and
granting leases for such a term of years as
would ensure to the tenants a return for money
expended on improvements. By similar means
and by establishing and stipulating for judicious

46 HORSES.

modes of culture, the value of land in Scotland
has in my own time been tripled ; and I have
no doubt that by adopting them the value of
Mr Wordsworth's property would be increased
in the same ratio ; but I was unable by this
argument or by any other to persuade him
to change his system of tenancy.

Here and throughout the States the agri
cultural horses are light and blood-like, and I
greatly admired the excellent control which
they and the agricultural oxen are under regu
lating all their motions with great alacrity by
the word of command ; but the horses appear
too slender, and a cross with the Suffolk,
Clydesdale, or heavy Lincolns, would in my
opinion make a great improvement.

The plough here is similar to that general
ly used in Scotland, but much lighter and al
so shorter both in the beam and in the stilts
or handles, a difference rendered necessary for
avoiding the stumps standing in the fields —
the remains of the ancient forests of which
few of the uplands are entirely cleared ; these
stumps are three or four feet high, and being

WAGES. 47

all hard- woods decay, as I was informed, in a
few years sufficiently to admit of their being
torn out.

They plough with two horses abreast and
it is said a pair of horses generally plough two
acres a-day, but the furrow is ebb, not gene
rally more than two or three inches. There
are no carts, the agricultural carriage being a
light waggon with a pole, drawn by two horses
abreast.

The average rate of labourer's wages is
about three shillings of our money per diem
with board and lodging. The hours of labour
are from sunrise to sunset ; all the crops are
mowed, and a man mows of wheat from two to
three acres and of red clover when clover hay
happens to be made, two acres per diem.

Colonel Wordsworth's regular establishment
consists of twenty men, and this he finds suf
ficient for his large farm ; they are boarded
and lodged in a commodious farm-house. He
has no difficulty in getting what additional
hands are required in harvest time ; and pro
fessional sheep-shearers attend at the proper

48 GEXESEE FLATS.

season and are paid by the piece, generally
accomplishing the shearing of his flock of 2000
sheep in the course of one week, but from the
description I had of it the work is but rough
ly done.

Having on the first day of my sojourn here
inspected Colonel Wordsworth's farm, I rode
out with him again on the 22d, and took a
circuit of twenty miles over this enchant
ing country of upland and meadow, already
one of the most beautiful and only requiring
a proper application of agricultural skill to be
rendered one of the most productive in the
world. As conveying some idea of the vigo
rous vegetation the soil is capable of sustaining,
I may mention that in the course of our ride
I saw in Colonel Wordsworth's meadows an
oak tree which I measured and found to be
fifteen yards in circumference near the ground.

The Genesee flats, of which as already ob
served these meadows are a portion, are 100
miles in length and from three to four in
breadth, thus perhaps exceeding in extent
any continuous tract of equally fertile land in

PRICE OF LAND. 49

any country. Two desirable estates which are
for sale were pointed out to me ; one of 300
acres, the other of 500, with a capital man
sion-house and orchards on each, and I was
told the price of such land in this locality ran
ges from L. 10 to L. 20 an acre.

I had to-day the honour of an introduction
to a General of militia, who for the present—
and long may he do so ! — occupies himself in
the peaceful pursuits of farming, and certainly
has nothing very military in his appearance.
He had been employed for two years in feed
ing two oxen, for competition at a coming
agricultural show ; they are of the red or De
von breed, and may weigh each from sixty to
seventy stones of 14 Ib. ; but although the Ge
neral seemed to have directed his whole ener
gy to the feeding of these beasts, and for his
own part regarded them as perfect wonders,
they were after all not better than what on
any Scotch farm would be called " good fat."

On Sunday the 23d of May, I attended an
Episcopal church — a very creditable building
for a country town — in which service was re
spectably performed.
E

50 MR WORDSWORTH.

I afterwards dined at the house of Mr
James Wordsworth. His lady is from Phila
delphia and of a family originally of the So
ciety of Friends. She has the gentle and
amiable manner peculiar to the female part of
that excellent people, and also no small share
of what their simple costume proves,

Needs not the foreign aid of ornament.

Mr James Wordsworth farms extensively, but
as his farm lies at a considerable distance, I
was obliged to forego the gratification of vi
siting it.

After dinner, however, I once more accom
panied his brother in a ride over his farm, and
was in consequence the more confirmed in
my first opinion, that with an improved breed
of stock and a better system of husbandry, he
might double or triple the value of it.

In the evening I learnt, in the course of
conversation with the elder Mr Wordsworth,
that in the neighbourhood of Caledonia, a town
about eleven miles off, the settlers are entire
ly Scotch, and as I found that locality was not
much out of my route, I determined to visit it.

DEPARTURE FROM GENESEO. 51

CHAPTER VII.

Departure from Geneseo — Caledonia — Mr Newbold's
farm and stock — Thunder storm — Mr Macnaughton's
farm — Instance of rapid rise in price of land — Scotch

families at Caledonia — Arrived with small capital .

Now independent.

May 1841.

ON the 24th I terminated my visit at the
hospitable mansion of Mr Wordsworth, and
left it deeply indebted to him and his family
for the most polite attention and kindness, and
with the pleasing hope of meeting and renew
ing our acquaintance at New York in the end
of June.

Colonel Wordsworth drove me to breakfast
at the house of a friend of his near Caledonia,
a Mr Newbold, a young man who in con
nection with a Mr Roy farms extensively.

After breakfast, which was sumptuous and

GENESEE FLATS.

ample as all American breakfasts are, I in
spected Mr Newbold's farm-offices which are
proportionally larger and more commodious
than any I had yet seen, and include a thrash
ing-mill moved by water — but still they are
not on what, in Scotland, would be considered
a proper scale, or properly laid out.

We then drove out to his farm which con
sists of fine rich meadow land on the Genesee
flats. His stock is of a better kind and in
much better condition than Colonel Words
worth's. I saw a very good Durham bull, se
veral Durham cows and heifers, and crosses of
these with the native breed, the quality of which
latter distinctly proved the vast improvement
of the stock here, that may be made by judi
cious crossing.

Our perambulation was, however, suddenly
interrupted by a violent thunder storm which
drove us back. For the first ten days after
my arrival at Boston, the weather had been
cold and very backward for the season, none
of the forest trees being yet in leaf. For the
last few days it had become hot and sultry,

SCOTS HIGHLANDER. 53

the thermometer in the shade ranging from
70° to 80°. I did not, however, feel any of
the oppression which, with the same degree of
heat, I should have suffered in our own coun-
try.

The storm continuing, we took an early
dinner, and I was regaled unexpectedly
enough with some excellent Scotch whisky.
When it cleared we drove to the farm of a Mr
Macnaughton, who was in his fields when we
arrived, but soon returned, and was delighted
to meet me, a countryman of his own. He
is a hardy looking Highlander, about sixty
years of age, from Lord Breadalbane's country.
He came to America fifteen years ago, with a
small capital, and now he possesses 500 acres
of the best wheat-land, all cleared and his own
property.

He showed me a field of sixty acres of
wheat, and mentioned in connection with it,
a circumstance furnishing a striking instance
of the rapid rise of the value of land in this
quarter. Soon after his arrival a neighbour
wished to purchase this field of him, and he

54* RISE OF LAND.

accordingly parted with it for 900 dollars, which
was considered the full value of it. In the
course of three years his neighbour determined
on selling the whole of his property, and of
fered back this field to Donald, but now at the
price of 3000 dollars ; this he at once agreed
to give ; a bargain was struck accordingly, and
the first crop of wheat yielded the purchase
money.

Donald's whole establishment smacks strong
ly of the Highlander. His domestic arrange
ments include none of the delicacies and but
a sparing allowance of the comforts of life ; in
short, he appears to be as much a scorner of
luxury as his stalwart countryman of old who
indignantly kicked away the snow-ball which,
in their bivouac, his too effeminate son had
prepared for his pillow.

In his farming economy he has improved
nothing on what he found to be the practice
of the country : — one large barn receives his
crops and accommodates his horses and cattle,
and like others he burns his straw and ploughs
in his clover for manure ; yet Donald has

SCOTS FAMILIES. 55

made money and continues to make it. What
might not be accomplished under a more ra
tional system ?

Limestone abounds here, but is not, as far
as I could learn, made use of in cultivating
land, and perhaps it is not necessary it should,
as the soil may already contain sufficiency of
calcareous earth. Stone dikes enclose the
fields and are neatly built as in Scotland.

The storm having long detained us, I had
it not in my power to visit any other of the
Scotch farm-houses, but proceeded to Caledo
nia, a considerable town with two hotels.

Here I procured an interview with a Scots
man, from whom I learnt that 250 Scotch fa
milies are settled in this neighbourhood ; the
greater part of them came over forty years
ago with very little capital, many of them
with hardly sufficient to purchase a yoke of
oxen ; they all got wealthy and now they
own farms varying from 200 to 600 acres
each. According to -my informant, the mode
of farming among these settlers, does not dif
fer from that followed by Mr Macnaughton,

56 FARMS.

and he, I have already noticed, plods on in
the imperfect course common in the country,
I also learnt that, no doubt from the calca
reous nature of the soil, the land here is pecu
liarly adapted to wheat which at present sells
at from four to five shillings of English money
per bushel of 60 llx

DEPARTURE FROM CALEDONIA. 57

CHAPTER VIII.

Departure from Caledonia — Batavia — Description of an
American Hotel — Lockport — Visit to Falls of Niaga
ra — Lewiston — Arrival at Toronto, Capital of Upper
Canada.

AT Caledonia I took leave of my kind friend,
Colonel Wordsworth, and having brought a
phaeton from Geneseo, I set out for Batavia,
distant seventeen miles, at six o'clock of the
afternoon. The road passes through a fine
corn country, all on limestone and enclosed
with substantial stone dikes, but more rugged
than any I had yet seen.

About nine o'clock I arrived at Batavia,
and having determined next day to take the
phaeton on to Lockport, distant thirty-three
miles, put up for the night at a grand-looking
hotel, which I found greatly infested with
bugs. It is not, however, from the irritation

58 HOTEL.

these bed-fellows occasioned me, that I am led
here to notice, that the interior of an Ameri
can hotel may be in woful contrast with its ex
ternal appearance.

In most towns there are to be seen two or
three hotels of much outward show, promising
great things within, but, entering any one of
them, you find the accommodation consists of
what is called a bar, being just a large tap
room, thronged with people of all descriptions,
and a great hall in which there is every day an
ordinary at fixed hours — breakfast usually at
seven, dinner at one, and supper at five o'clock.
This hall not only is the eating-room of stran
gers, but is frequented by a great proportion
of the town's people, who certainly dispatch
every meal with wonderful celerity and in
stantly depart. Private parlours there are
none ; and if you wish to be alone, you must
sit in your bedroom, but unless with much dif
ficulty and grudging, you can be served with
nothing away from the ordinary ; for as the
business of the house centres there and in the
bar, no attention is willingly paid anywhere

FALLS OF NIAGARA. 59

else. Mine host himself is seldom visible, and
the waiters attend to your orders so tardily
and with so much of the appearance of indif
ference, that you are strongly tempted to ac
celerate their movements by a certain applica
tion of your foot. However, by putting a re
straint on my temper, which I confess I at
first managed with some difficulty, I found that
I ultimately got what I wanted.

Next day, the 25th, I proceeded on my jour
ney to Lockport, the country gradually lessen
ing in attractiveness, the quantity of cleared
land being comparatively small, and the pro
portion of forest consequently greater than in
the country I had just left.

From Lockport I passed by the railway to
the Falls of Niagara, the distance being twenty-
four miles ; and on the 26th, I crossed over to
the Canadian side to behold these amazing
works of nature, of the grandeur of which de
scriptions are familiar to every reader.

I have only to observe that on viewing
them, I sensibly experienced the disappoint
ment usually attending the actual sight of any

60 FALLS OF NIAGARA.

remarkable object regarding which previous
accounts have given rise to unbounded expec
tations. No doubt the whole body of a mighty
river falling precipitously from a height so great
as 150 feet or more, is an object of true sublimity,
but I now found that even of such an object
exaggerated ideas may be preconceived ; and
although the scenery connected with the Falls
has been justly represented as extremely fine,
I was unable to elevate my notions of it greatly
above the recollection I had of scenery in some
parts of the Highlands of Scotland. In a word,
I left the renowned Falls of Niagara with an
image of them on my mind much less magni
ficent than what had been impressed upon it
before I saw them.

To Lewiston I proceeded by the railway,
and from thence by a steamer down the river
to Niagara, whence I crossed Lake Ontario to
Toronto.

TORONTO, 61

CHAPTER IX.

Population of Toronto — Streets and Buildings — Mr A.
Wood — Arrival at Hamilton — Difference between peo
ple in Upper Canada and those in the States — Features
of the country — Cleared land — Means of transport and
markets wanting — Speculators in land — Favourable
settlement for labouring people only — Expense of Cul
tivation — Visit to Mr Ferguson at Woodhill — Meeting
with the Chief of Macnab — Introduction to Sir Allan
Macnab — His treatment by Whig Government — My
purpose in visiting Upper Canada alluded to — Tempe
rature — Return to Toronto — Bishop Strachan.

May 1841.

TORONTO, the capital of Upper Canada,
pleasantly situate on the banks of Lake Onta
rio, is said now to contain 15,000 inhabitants.
The streets are good, the buildings respecta
ble, and two handsome churches, one Presby
terian and the other Episcopalian, add much
to the appearance of the town. Of the latter

62 HAMILTON.

church Bishop Strachan a native of Aber
deen is minister.

My arrangements did not admit of my re
maining here for more than one day on the
present occasion, and after the pleasure of
meeting with my old friend Alexander Wood
who, in the course of the forty years he has re
sided and carried on business in this town, has
acquired a large fortune, I embarked in a
steamer for Hamilton. There I arrived on the
28th of May, and had the gratification of find
ing my daughter in good health.

I remained at Hamilton until the 8th of
June, and in the interval made frequent ex
cursions in the province, taking every oppor
tunity of acquainting myself with its present
situation.

On entering Canada I had been impressed
with a marked difference between it and the
United States. In the latter the people
were everywhere distinguished by that cheer
fulness and appearance of contentment which
attend activity and exertion in peaceful pur
suits. In Canada there prevailed an almost

UPPER CANADA. 63

universal gloom, the consequence of recent in
ternal commotion ; of the still existing conflict
and rancour of political feeling ; or of the
withered hopes of many who, having speculat
ed largely in land, have received little or no
return for their money. This was my early
impression, and anything I have since observ
ed, or by inquiry ascertained, has served to
confirm it, and to satisfy me that of the two
countries the States hold out for agricultural
pursuits, by far the greater advantages to per
sons possessed of any capital.

With the exception of portions of cleared
land varying from fifty acres in some situations,
to several hundreds in others, Upper Canada
is an immense and trackless forest, forlorn
and forbidding at best, and in many places ren
dered more gloomy and repulsive, by the trees
having been burnt preparatory to being cut
down, and consequently now presenting to the
eye nothing but bare and blackened poles.

And with regard to what is called cleared
land, it consists of no more than a patch here
and there, on which the huge pines that for

64 UPPER CANADA.

ages had been tenants of the soil, have by the
application of fire and axe been reduced to
stumps four feet in height, so thick set as in
many places to bid defiance to the plough,
and to preclude any mode of cultivation ex
cept sowing and hand-raking the seed.

There are here no railways, and no interior
water-carriage, advantages so amply enjoyed
in the States, and although there are roads,
they are of such a description as to be nearly
impassable, excepting in winter when the
sleigh is made use of.

Upper Canada, too, is comparatively destitute
of local markets, or of any proper outlet for the
surplus produce of the land ; for the population
is not only thin and widely scattered, but them
selves chiefly agricultural, each family there
fore raising sufficient for its own supply ; and
there are no towns of any magnitude to create
any considerable demand for the surplus, nor
if there were, are easy means of transport af
forded.

In such circumstances, it is by no means
surprising to find that the greater number of

CLEARING LAND. 65

those who had speculated in land have suffer
ed grievous disappointment, and that of those
coming under the description of gentlemen
who had attempted to convert the forest into
corn land by the force of money, the greater
number quickly got rid of it and then either
betook themselves to other pursuits, or as
sometimes happened, becoming disgusted and
reckless, gave themselves up to dissipation.

There is, however, one description of per
son to whom a settlement in these forests may
prove tolerable — the labourer, and especially
the hardy Highlander who glad to escape
from privation at home and delighted to roam
at large, may with his own hands and assist
ed by a family of sons, erect a rude hovel of
log, gradually clear a quantity of land suffi-
cent for a subsistence, and in the course of
time come to possess a small property, the
height of his ambition. Except to such per
sons clearing land here cannot be attractive
or made remunerating.

The objection which in most cases applies
to the cultivation of waste land on a large

66

CLEARING LAND.

scale in Scotland applies here with redoubled
force ; — the expense of the improvement is
more than, when improved, the land is worth.

It may give some idea of the disadvantage
under which the clearing of land in Upper
Canada must be accomplished, to advert to
what takes place in clearing a fir wood in
Scotland. There, although labour costs little
more than one-half of its price in Canada, and
although the largest trees are but as walking
sticks in comparison with the Canadian pines,
wood-land cannot be cleared and put in a
condition for a corn crop, for less than L 20
per acre. The crop of trees may go far, per
haps do more than answer this expense ; but
in Upper Canada, in clearing land, the trees
are altogether valueless and yield no return
for the trouble and expense of cutting them
down and collecting their immense trunks
into piles to be burnt ; and after all, their
stumps remain for a great many years to en
cumber the ground and obstruct cultivation.

In short, the art of cultivating land is not
perhaps practised in any country where,

MR FERGUSON. 6?

viewing it generally, more discouraging ob
stacles to profitable agriculture present them
selves, than are to be encountered in Upper
Canada.

During one of my excursions from Hamil
ton, I visited and dined with another old
friend, Adam Ferguson, who resides about
seven miles from that place, on a small pro
perty which he has named Woodhill after his
estate in Scotland. Here he has built a cot
tage commanding beautiful views, particularly
of Burlington Bay, but its own situation is rug
ged,, solitary and gloomy, — so much so that
I could not help giving utterance to my sur
prize that he should have selected for his resi
dence a place which to me seemed fit only
for the abode of wolves and foxes, or of some
recluse disgusted with the haunts of man.

In the course of seven years, Mr Ferguson
has cleared or partially cleared a few acres,
of which the soil appears sandy and of inferior
quality, such as in Scotland would not be con
sidered worth a rent of ten shillings an acre ;
but he possesses here but a small extent of

68

CHIEF OF MACNAB.

land, the bulk of his property lying forty or
fifty miles up the country, where he has settled
several of his sons and where, I am informed,
the soil is good and they have cleared 1200
acres. Mr Ferguson is the only one I heard
of who has made a fortunate speculation in
land in Upper Canada, having succeeded in
disposing to advantage of several lots of what
he had purchased.

I had the pleasure of meeting at Toronto
the chief of Macnab who, some fifteen years
ago, emigrated to Canada with his whole
clan, and settled about 100 miles up the coun
try. He is a fine representation of the High
land chieftain of days gone by — tall and state
ly and having, with perfect courtesy, the bear
ing of a man born to be obeyed. He seems
well satisfied with his present position and de
scribes things as flourishing in his clanship.

I was also introduced to Sir Allan Macnab
who has built a magnificent house a mile or so
from Hamilton, close on Burlington Bay, and
made out and enclosed a large park in the
English style. Sir Allan is also a fine-look-

SIR ALLAN MACNAB. 69

ing man, his countenance strongly indicative
of that intelligence and resolution which he is
known in an eminent degree to possess. In
the shortest interview one discovers in him the
well-bred and accomplished gentleman. The
interest he has taken and the services he has
rendered in the affairs of Canada, have raised
his character so high, that any eulogium from
me might be deemed presumptuous. Suffice
it to allude to the presence of mind, promp
titude and energy with which, two years
ago, he led out the militia force which he
commands, and saved Toronto and its neigh
bourhood from being sacked and burnt by
a numerous body of rebels, when all the re
gular troops had been withdrawn to the lower
province.

I was hospitably entertained at the house of
Sir Allan, and had the honour of an introduc
tion to Lady Macnab and his family. In
conversation with him on the objects of my in
quiry, he informed me that, eleven years ago,
Hamilton consisted of a single house, and the
country all around was a dense forest. It now
contains 2000 inhabitants, and cultivation has

70 UPPER CANADA.

been extended to a circuit of three or four
miles. From this and other circumstances he
mentioned, Sir Allan argues that by and by
improvements will proceed rapidly, although
he admits that in the meantime things are at
a stand- still.

Sir Allan was President of £he late Legisla
tive Council, but by the Whig government his
merits have not been duly requited. Their
influence was used against him at the late elec
tion, and it was their policy to raise to power
individuals whom he had found it necessary to
put in gaol as rebels. Sir Allan is enthusias
tic in his partiality to Upper Canada, and if
the observations I have made regarding it
shall ever meet his eye, they will not probably
receive his concurrence ; but I have no doubt
the liberality of his own opinions will give me
credit for the sincerity of mine, as well as for
the assurance that I should feel extreme regret
if the expression of them were to prove un
pleasant to any of my countrymen, and more
particularly to any of my valued friends.

With reference to the opinion I have form
ed of Upper Canada, I may mention that the

CAPABILITIES. 71

chief object of my journey was to visit my
daughter who has chosen to cast her lot for
life on this side the Atlantic, but was unde
termined, until I should decide, whether her
husband and she should purchase a permanent
residence in the Province or in the States.
Now, looking to the matter of present com
fort only — taking into view that the States are
in comparison with Upper Canada, an old
country, in many parts highly cultivated, and
with good society — and that the Province is
but in its infancy and only holds out pros
pects of advantage to be realized by some fu
ture generation, — I had no hesitation in pro
nouncing in favour of the former.

This explanation of my purpose will serve
to show that my opinions have not been form
ed altogether gratuitously, nor without consi
deration ; but at the same time I should wish
it to be understood, that although I have de
scribed with faithfulness what fell under my
own observation, or was derived from the most
authentic information I could obtain, yet my
opportunities of examining into the agricultu
ral affairs of Upper Canada were very limited.

72 TORONTO.

It is a noble country certainly, and one day
may rise to immense importance ; but behind,
as it is in cultivation, and neglected as it has
been by the government at home, and defi
cient as it yet is in capital, its progress in im
provement must, to all present appearance,
necessarily be slow.

It will thus be understood that while I would
recommend the States to the choice of British
emigrants, in preference to Upper Canada, I
am induced to do so entirely from a conside
ration of existing circumstances ; as I do not
doubt the time may come when, from the in
crease of population — the enlargement of pre
sent towns, and the growth of others — the
establishment of railways and other means of
internal communication and access to markets
— and the accomplishment of numerous other
desiderated improvements which it is in the
power of Government to introduce and en
courage, the Province will acquire attractions
for emigrants, of which it is yet destitute, and
afford those advantages which the States now
exclusively present to them.

On the 8th of June I took leave of my

BISHOP STRACHAN. 73

daughter and returned by steamer to Toron
to, my face being now fairly turned home
wards.

The soil round Hamilton is of a sandy na
ture, and the town is encompassed by lofty
wooded hills ; during all the time of my so
journ there the thermometer in the shade,
ranged from 85° to 90°, and this height of
temperature, aggravated by the nature of the
locality, I felt both night and day extremely
oppressive, but yet not at all injurious to health.

At Toronto I now dined with Bishop Stra-
chan, a man of great intelligence and agreeable
manners, and much esteemed and respected.
His living is worth L. 1000 a-year, and he has
an excellent house just out of the town, where
I was received by him and Mrs Strachan and
their son, with that heartiness of welcome, and
unaffected kindness, for which in Scotland un
sophisticated families are still noted. Next
day, the 9th, I spent with Alexander Wood,
with all the gratification which the reminis
cence of former days, and the renewal of old
friendship could inspire.

G

74 BUFFALO.

CHAPTER X.

Route to New York — Buffalo — Sail to Erie — Departure
by stage for Pittsburgh — The trials of that convey
ance — Comparison of old Scotch roads — Wildness of
country between Erie and Pittsburgh — Crops — Indian
corn — Stock — Difficult ascents — Arrival at Pitts
burgh.

June 1841.

HAVING resolved to return to New York
by a route different from that by which I came,
I sailed for Lewiston at seven o'clock of the
morning of the 10th of June, and thence pro
ceeded by the railway forty miles to Buffalo,
which, travelling over an uninviting country,
I reached about six o'clock in the evening.

Buffalo, from " small beginnings," has risen
during the present century to a town of great
trade and wealth ; having a population of
20,000, with spacious streets, handsome shops,

LAKE ERIE.

numerous public buildings, and exhibiting all
the life and activity of a busy and thriving
shipping-place, from whence trade is carried
on with all the western and southern states.

At nine o'clock on the llth, I embarked in
a steamer on Lake Erie for the town of Erie.
The sail was delightful, the vessel having been
steered near enough the land to afford a view
of a beautiful country enriched by cultivation
and enlivened by numerous handsome man
sions interspersed among the fields and forests.

At Erie, a small country town, possessing
no remarkable feature, I arrived at six o'clock,
and remained all night.

Next morning at eight o'clock, I set off for
Pittsburgh, distant 130 miles, and, although
I had hoped for exemption from a repetition
of the trials of an American stage-coach, I here
found myself once more compelled to submit
to them, as, in travelling from Erie to Pitts
burgh, I had no choice but to take my seat in
one of those rude and rickety machines, carry
ing nine passengers all stowed inside, in three
rows, as formerly described, and to submit, so

76 ROADS.

circumstanced, to be jolted over one of the
worst roads on which wheel ever rolled.

I can remember since the roads in Scotland
were so bad that travelling in a post-chaise
was a kind of adventure, and it was a usual
thing, when any one projected the shortest
journey, to make interest to procure for the oc
casion the services of the most expert post
boy at the inn, as affording some security
against the common catastrophe of an upset ;
but the Scotch roads of that period were bow
ling-greens in comparison with those which it
was now my doom to be dragged over.

Nor was the injucundity of the conveyance
relieved by any amenity in the country through
which we plodded, it being for the greater part
a continued forest, with now and then, hi the
wilderness, a portion of land of 100 or 200
acres, cleared in the roughest manner, and
cropped among the remaining stumps writh
wheat, clover, and Indian corn, by farmers ap
parently in a small way, and generally dwel
ling in uncomfortable-looking log-houses.
This vast tract of country, a few years ago,

CROPS. 77

was Congress land, but is now all disposed of,
and in progress of clearing.

The wheat crops in our course looked well,
and also, if I might judge, the Indian corn.
The latter, I may here mention, is grown in
rows, having a space of four feet between every
two, and the plants in the rows three feet asun
der, two seeds, as I learnt, being always dib
bled into each hole. The land may thus be
very effectually horse and hand-hoed, and, in
deed, it appeared to me, that no crop I had
ever seen admits of so thorough a working of
the land in summer as this does.

I could not, however, learn whether Indian
corn is found to be an exhausting crop, as
" exhausting crop" seems not to be a term in
an American farmer's vocabulary ; at least it
has not been yet recognized in his language,
although a persistence in his present manage
ment may ere long illustrate its meaning.
From the class to which this plant belongs, it
should be inferred, that it is to be included
among deteriorating crops.

The stock I observed in the course of this

78 PITTSBURGH.

part of my tour were in general poor half-
starved animals, showing as usual, on the part
of the owners, a woful deficiency in this branch
of rural economy.

The penance of this journey was not con
fined to our being dragged over the rocks,
large stones, stumps, holes, and quags, which
everywhere gave an interesting diversity to
the surface of the road. With all these in the
way, we had to toil up mountains approaching
nearer to the perpendicular than any over
which I had yet seen a carriage road conduct
ed, and generally it happened, that, when we
had surmounted and descended one mountain,
another, high, rugged, and erect, immediately
occurred, and seemed to bid defiance to our
further progress. But I must own the views
from these eminences were certainly of the
grandest description, and afforded some recom
pense for the toil of attaining them.

It was, however, with great joy I at length
found myself at Pittsburgh at half-past nine
o'clock on Sunday night, having to a journey
of 130 miles, taken thirty-seven hours, during

PITTSBURGH. 79

which time my bones and joints had feelingly
sustained the grinding and friction produced
by the worst of conveyances on the worst of
roads.

80 PITTSBURGH.

CHAPTER XL

Pittsburgh — Ohio River — Iron founderies — Steam-boat
machinery — Trade — Departure for Wheelin — Coun
try between Pittsburgh and Wheelin — Arrival at
Wheelin — Its communication with eastern states —
Departure for Frederick — Country travelled over— •
Enter the Alleghanies — Cross these mountains — Arriv
al at Haggerston — Waggons and horses — Weather —
Frederick — Arrival at Baltimore — The City — Visit to
Mr Belzouver's farm.

June 1841.

PITTSBURGH in Pennsylvania contains about
20,000 inhabitants. It stands at the point of
junction of the Alleghany and Monongohela
rivers, here forming, by their union, the great
but unruffled Ohio, which runs a course of
about 1200 miles to join the Mississippi, and
is said to be one of the most beautiful rivers
in the world.

From the number of large iron founderies

WHEELIN. 81

at Pittsburgh, it ranks as the Birmingham of
the states. It furnishes a great proportion of
the steam-boat machinery used in America,
and trades with the southern and western
states by means of steam-vessels, of which I
counted thirty of large dimensions, lying at
the different wharves along the banks of the
river. The town seems busy and flourishing,
but is rendered disagreeable by the smoke of
its numerous furnaces.

Thinking I had had quite enough of the
American stage, I proposed going to Wheelin
by water, the distance by that conveyance be
ing ninety-five miles, which is forty miles more
than the distance by land, but after having
had my luggage put on board a steamer, I
found there was, from the present shallowness
of the water, great difficulty in getting down
the river, and that I might be stuck fast in the
channel for some days. I therefore had my
luggage disembarked, and on the 15th of June
once more placed myself in the stage, expect
ing certainly no greater enjoyment than 1 had

82 CROPS.

already experienced in a similar conveyance,
but in this I was most agreeably disappointed.

After leaving Pittsburgh a few miles, I
found the country altogether change its cha
racter ; the road macadamized and sound ;
the country open ; the fields large and well
cultivated, and completely cleared of the stumps
which obstructed and greatly disfigured almost
every field I had hitherto seen. In short, I
was now, comparatively speaking, in an old
country.

The crops consisted of wheat and Indian
corn, with occasionally patches of oats and
rye. Barley appears to be little known as a
crop in the States, at least I had not yet seen
a single field of it ; nor, although I understand
beans, pease, and also turnips, are cultivated
in some places, have I observed any of these
grown by fanners. Indian corn seems to be
the great staple, and to come in pkce of our
fallow or cleaning-crops, for which purpose, as
I have already observed, it seems, in one re
spect, well calculated. Red clover is culti-

WHEELIN. 83

vated extensively, and, as in other places,
ploughed in as manure for wheat.

The stock I saw here is of a better descrip
tion than in any of the places previously visit
ed by me, but still by no means first-rate, nor
at all like what should be found in such a
country. Although I was told this is consi
dered a sheep country, the few sheep I saw in
it were miserable animals.

Such continued to be the character of the
country all the way to Wheelin, and in many
places it was truly beautiful.

About eleven o'clock A. M. I arrived at Wheel-
in, a small town on the Ohio possessing some
iron founderies, but deriving its chief import
ance from being the great outlet from New
York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington,
and other places eastward, to New Orleans
and the great southern and western states.

The communication from those cities is
maintained, first by the several lines of rail
road emerging from them, to Frederick, in
Maryland, and from thence, by what is called
" the great national road," across the Alle-

84 FREDERICK.

ghany mountains, to Wheelin. From the lat
ter town to New Orleans, the distance is about
2000 miles, down the Ohio and Mississippi,
and it is accomplished by steam-boats in an
incredibly short time.

At one p. M. I left Wheelin by stage — to
which I had become somewhat reconciled —
for Frederick, distant 224 miles.

For the first forty or fifty miles, the coun
try was in some degree open and cultivated,
but after that we got into forest, and gradual
ly into the depths of the Alleghany moun
tains. The road was still sound and good, but the
hills may without exaggeration be described
as tremendous, the ascents not only being ex
cessively steep, but continuing so for many
miles on end.

Notwithstanding their great elevation, these
mountains are clothed to the top with fine
timber, occasionally interspersed with patches
of cleared land ; and as in this quarter im
mense tracts, formerly Congress land, are now
the property of individuals, cultivation will
doubtless be rapidly extended.

ALLEGHANIES. 85

If, for the difficulty of the ascents between
Erie and Pittsburgh, the traveller is recom
pensed by the views from their summits, much
greater must be his gratification on accom
plishing the more toilsome task of surmount
ing the Alleghanies. Placed there on a ridge
of the earth, upheaved hundreds of yards
above the general surface, and extending to
nearly 1000 miles in length, and from 100 to
200 miles in breadth, he experiences an exal
tation of mind befitting the contemplation of
the boundless regions encompassing him —
but yesterday composing inhospitable wilds,
peopled by ruthless savages, — to-day possessed
by an enlightened and powerful nation, under
whom majestic rivers, wending their far jour
neys among primeval forests, have become sub
servient to the purposes of wide-spreading
commerce, while every where appear splendid
cities, handsome towns, and cultivated fields,
with all that for utility or for ornament civili
zation brings in its train.

On Friday the 18th, in the morning, we
descended from the mountains, and arrived at

86 HAGGERSTON.

Haggerston in Maryland. Both here and in
Pennsylvania, which we had now left, the
horses are strong and heavy, resembling the
waggon-horses of England; and, indeed, the
waggons employed in transporting commodi
ties from Frederick across the Alleghanies,
drawn by six or eight powerful animals, put
one much in mind of the old English stage
waggons, to which he was accustomed forty
years ago.

Between Haggerston and Frederick, a dis
tance of twenty-five miles, the country is high
ly cultivated, the fields large and quite clear
ed of stumps, and the crops of wheat abun
dant and far advanced.

From the day I left Toronto, we had expe
rienced frequent heavy thunder-storms, and
the weather throughout the journey was cool
and pleasant, and generally of a temperature
not materially different from that of my own
country, consequently without any of that op-
pressive heat which I endured in Canada.

I arrived at Frederick, which is but a small
town, at three o'clock afternoon, having been fif-

BALTIMORE. 87

ty hours on the journey of 224 miles from
Wheelin ; and at ten o'clock the same night,
I set off by the railway for Baltimore, which
I reached at two o'clock next morning.

Baltimore, the capital of Maryland, ranks as
the fourth city of the Union ; the population
is said to exceed 100,000, of which about one-
third consists of free people of colour or of
slaves, and of the white inhabitants, a large
proportion are Roman Catholics.

In the appearance of the city there is no
thing which very peculiarly distinguishes it from
other large and wealthy towns in the Union ;
the streets are good ; the houses, chiefly of
brick, are neat ; the shops fine ; and nume
rous public buildings, and not a few conspicu
ous monuments, add much to the general ef
fect.

Among the monuments here is that erected
in honour of the great American Liberator,
which bears a resemblance to the Monument
of London, and, including the statue of Wash
ington, rises about 200 feet in height. A spi
ral stair of 300 steps inside, leads to the sum-

88 MR BELZOUVER'S FARM.

mit, on which the statue is placed, and from
thence is enjoyed a complete view of the city
and surrounding country, with the Patapsco
on which the city stands, winding its course
to the Chesapeake ; with the combined rich
ness and magnificence of this scenery I was
much delighted.

In the afternoon I drove out with the land
lord of the hotel, Mr Belzouver, to inspect a
farm of 300 acres possessed by him, four miles
from the city. This farm is well cultivated in
the American manner, with wheat and Indian
corn, and I found Mr Belzouver, displaying
as a farmer, more enterprize and tact than com
mon, having imported several Durham cows
and bulls, and possessing a herd of eighteen
cows and heifers, partly reared by himself. As
regards shape, breeding, and condition, they
are the best I had yet seen in the States, and
indeed, as to some of the animals, as good as
are to be met with in any country.

After all, there was even in his case an ob
vious deficiency in housing, although, from
the advanced state of the season, the condition

HUSBANDRY. 89

of his cattle did not betray it so very obvious
ly as in cases that had previously come under
my observation ; and it also appeared to me
that a great improvement in the productive
ness of the land might be effected by a bet
ter system of husbandry.

H

90 RICHMOND,

CHAPTER XII.

Departure for Richmond — Washington — Sail up the Po
tomac — Fredericks!) urgh — Arrival at Richmond —
Condition of slaves in Virginia — Mr Marx's farm — His
mode of farming — Culture of oats — Objections to his
farming — Allowance of seed — Mules used in agricul
ture — Improvements suggested — To be partly adopted
by Mr Marx — Flour-mills — Cotton-mills — Departure
from Richmond — Arrival at Washington — Capitol —
House of Representatives and Senate — Introduction to
the President — Mount Vernon — The residence of Wa
shington — His tomb — Return to Washington.

June 1841.

BEING desirous of acquainting myself with
the condition of the slaves in Virginia, I left
Baltimore en route for Richmond, capital of
that State, by the railway, at nine A. M. on the
20th ; arrived at Washington, forty miles
from Baltimore, at eleven ; and from thence
embarked in a steamer bound up the Potomac.

This is one of the principal fishing rivers in

POTOMAC. 91

the States, and along both its banks are nu
merous fishing stations. To describe the great
beauty of its scenery, would be very much to
repeat a description of what is to be seen on
all the great rivers and lakes of America, I
had visited. I think it may correctly enough
be said that, if any one to whom the scenery
of the Thames above London is familiar, were
to fancy the contexture of its natural objects
very much increased in magnitude, and viewed
in an atmosphere of great lustre and tranquil
lity, he might form a tolerable notion of the
richness and grandeur of the summer scenery
of an American river.

At five P. M. I landed at a wharf sixty miles
from Washington, and thence proceeded by
stage to Fredericksburgh, over nine miles of
road as abominable as can be imagined.

For the remaining distance of sixty miles I
placed myself on the railway, and at half-past
eleven reached my destination at Richmond,
having in fourteen hours travelled one hun
dred miles by railway, sixty by water, and nine
by the stage.

92 RICHMOND.

Richmond, an extremely handsome town,
contains about 40,000 inhabitants, of whom
two-thirds are persons of colour, and a great
proportion of these slaves. Every servant,
man, woman, and child, is a slave, but to my
great and agreeable surprise I found slavery
here possesses none of the horrors I had at
home been accustomed to hear connected with
it — for the slaves in Virginia are well clothed
and well fed, and kindly treated, and to all ap
pearance contented and happy ; indeed, I should
say their condition physically is one of great com
fort and enjoyment, in comparison with that
of our own manufacturing population, by thou
sands of whom, I cannot doubt, it would, in
relation to the necessaries of life, be looked up
on with envy.

The men, for the greater part, are strong,
muscular, and good-looking ; and of the
women, many are handsome, particularly the
nursery maids, housemaids, and other domes
tics, who, in dress and person, appear as
gay, and tasteful, and tidy, as the most buxom
of our lasses.

SLAVERY. 93

The term slave sounds harshly in a British
ear, and when I was told by a nice light heart
ed looking girl, that she was a slave, I could
not help regarding her with a feeling of com
miseration ; she, however, seemed to think
nothing of the designation, and I am glad to
believe it is, at least in this State, felt in a
great measure as but " a name."

What I had been told of masters selling the
offspring of their slaves, as we would sell lambs,
the produce of our ewes, I found to be totally
without foundation. On the contrary, great
attention is paid to the wants and comfort,
and also the moral and religious instruction of
slave children, and any master or family act
ing differently towards them would be scouted.

When it happens, as often it does, that any
one owns more slaves than he himself has oc
casion to employ, he allows them to serve in
different capacities in the employment of other
persons, and particularly as domestic servants,
in which capacity they receive wages from the
employers at the rate of eight or ten dollars a
month, one-half of which goes to the master

94 SLAVERY.

j

who clothes his slaves and otherwise cares for
them. In this way it happens that many fa
milies have slave servants not their own, but
to whom they pay wages.

There may be masters who are tyrannical
and cruel to their slaves, but unhappily tyran
ny and cruelty to dependents are not peculiar
to slave owners. I believe it might be easy
to adduce authenticated instances of the treat
ment of parish apprentices in free England,
the atrocity and horribleness of which would
draw tears from the eyes of any slave owner in
Virginia.

Far am I, however, from advocating the
continuance of slavery in America. There
and everywhere else, even under the most hu
mane treatment, it is a debasement of human
nature, admitting of no redeeming quality ;
for although a kind master may slacken and
make gentle the bonds in which he holds the
body of his slave, there is yet a chain that fetters
his mind — leaving it under the influence of all
the vitiating passions, but placing far beyond

SLAVERY. 95

its reach every motive to ennobling virtues.
For this, freedom alone is the remedy.

No right thinking man, therefore, can ap
prove of slavery, and I understand none dis
approve of it more, or with greater sincerity de
sire its abolition than do at this moment many of
the slave owners of Virginia and Maryland, al
though a mistaken policy in other states as yet
prevents the accomplishment of their wishes.

In the meantime it is gratifying to know
that in these two States, and as far as I can
learn in all others in which slavery is tolerated,
the condition of the slave is not peculiarly
subject to the inflictions of inhumanity, or
liable to any of the atrocious barbarities which
in my own country are unsparingly imputed to
slave owners, often, I believe, by persons
whose zeal is greater than their knowledge.

At Richmond I had a favourable oppor
tunity of continuing my observation of Ameri
can agriculture. I had brought a letter to a
Mr Marx, one of two brothers of great opu
lence and consideration, the one conducting
the business of a banker and general merchant,

96 MR MARX'S FARM.

the other residing on and farming their estate,
consisting of 800 acres of rich alluvial soil, on
James river, two miles out of Richmond. I
was kindly invited by the banker to inspect
the farm, and I gladly, along with him, there
visited his brother.

I found the whole farm under a system of
tillage, the crops being wheat, Indian corn,
and clover, with a considerable breadth of oats.

I had observed, from the time I entered
Virginia, that oats is a crop much cultivated
in that State, although the produce is very
poor both in quantity and quality, and in most
instances such as our farmers would think not
worth being harvested.

On Mr Marx's farm, from the superior qua
lity of the soil, the crop of oats was better
than any I had seen, but still such as would
with us be considered miserable ; and from
what I had observed, and understood from
Mr Marx, it was evident that the climate of
the States is from its heat and drought unfa
vourable to the growth of oats ; for although
when the seed is imported from Britain, the

MODE OF FARMING. 97

first crop is pretty fair, yet after that it gra
dually degenerates, and accordingly the general
weight of oats here does not exceed 28 or
30 Ib. per imperial bushel, a weight of grain
which would not be marketable in our country.

I was sorry that of Mr Marx's mode of hus
bandry I could not approve much more than
of what I had remarked elsewhere.

His crops were no doubt richer and more
luxuriant than any I had seen, but for this it
appeared to me he was mainly indebted to a
superiority of soil and climate ; and as an in
stance of his advantage in this respect I may
mention that I saw upon his farm 100 acres
of wheat now quite ripe, and intended to be
reaped next day, the 23d of June.

He keeps little or no stock of any descrip
tion, and magnificent fields of clover were
destined to be ploughed in as manure for
wheat. This clover if given to stock in the
yard would, I need hardly notice, have served
to convert his straw into manure, then all ly
ing about and going to waste, or partially
sold in the town of Richmond, whence no com-

98 MODE OF FARMING.

pensating return in the shape of manure is
brought to the farm.

The consequence of this system has been
to pinch the land to such a degree, that this
alluvial and naturally most fertile soil, capa
ble under judicious management of carrying
crops of I should say fifty bushels of wheat per
acre, produces no more than from twenty-five
to thirty.

At the same time I should notice a singu
lar fact alluded to by Mr Marx, and which
indeed I had remarked before, but omitted to
mention, as being general over the States, that
more than a bushel, or a bushel and one-fourth
.of wheat per acre is never sown, and to this
practice I think may in some measure be as
cribed the lightness of their crops.

Another circumstance no doubt contribut
ing to the same effect, is the great heat of the
sun, the thermometer at this season commonly
ranging in the shade from 85° to 95°, a height
of temperature which may give a hurtful pre
maturity to the crops of wheat.

From these different causes — stinting the

MODE OF FARMING. 99

soil of manure, deficiency in the quantity of
seed, and in intenseness of atmospheric heat —
it no doubt arises that land of the greatest ap
parent fertility produces crops short in the
ear, and seldom weighing more than 60 Ib.
per bushel British measure \ and that the
wheat fields of the States do not show those
fine waving crops we are accustomed to see in
Britain.

Mules are chiefly used for agricultural pur
poses, both here and in Maryland ; they are
large strong animals, seemingly from Maltese
asses, and, I understand, endure the heat of
the climate much better than horses.

From the period of the year at which I vi
sited Virginia, I had not a very good oppor
tunity of forming a judgment of the manner
in which field work is performed. I learnt
sufficient, however, to convince me not only
that it is done in an old-fashioned and ineffi
cient mode, but that the Virginia landowner
would find his account in bringing from a good
district in England or Scotland, a person prac
tically conversant with grain and stock farm-

100 CHANGE OF SYSTEM.

ing, and placing his agricultural concerns un
der his direction. By this means such a farm
as that of Mr Marx might soon be advanced
in productiveness to an amount greatly beyond
the salary of such a manager, and an improved
and advantageous practice of husbandry would
spread itself and take the place of the defec
tive and comparatively profitless system now
followed in the States.

I was glad to find Mr Marx not obstinate
ly wedded to old modes ; for in the discus
sions on agricultural subjects I had with him
and his brother after dinner at their country
house, I was able so far to convince him of the
benefit he would reap from a change of system,
that he resolved to give a fair trial to what I
suggested, and instead of ploughing in his lux
uriant crops of clover, to use them in soiling
his horses and cattle, to cart out the manure
to be so obtained for his wheat, and to en-
crease his allowance of seed to four bushels an
acre, the usual quantity given by British farm
ers.

I can have no doubt of the favourable re-

SPRING WHEAT. 101

suit of this experiment, more especially as
regards the encrease of seed, having been in
formed by him that from their alternate frosts
and rains in winter, the wheat plants are very
liable to be thrown out, a circumstance which
renders it, with them, unsafe to sow wheat after
September, or consequently following Indian
corn, which does not ripen till October. This
appeared to me an obvious additional reason
for thicker sowing.

I conceive also that Mr Marx should find
spring wheat an advantageous crop. I am
aware that summer follows winter so rapidly
here, as to leave but little interval for spring
work, but spring corn to a certain extent is ne
vertheless cultivated ; and if the wheat land
were prepared and the manure well ploughed in
before winter, there should not I think be any
difficulty in sowing and harrowing the seed as
soon as winter departs. Throwing out the
plants by frost would be thus avoided, and the
excellence of the climate would secure the
seasonable perfecting of the spring sown crop.

Mr Marx enjoys a great advantage in hav-

102 COTTON MILL.

ing in his neighbourhood extensive flour mills
where he finds a ready market for his wheat,
Virginia flour being in high estimation all over
the States.

My time being limited I had it not in my
power to examine any other farm in this quar
ter, although I was told that, forty or fifty
miles up the James river, there are to be seen
many fine farms on a large scale ; in fact I
might easily have passed a month in pursuing
agricultural enquiries in this State.

In returning to Richmond I visited an ex
tensive cotton mill on James river, at which
both white and black children are employed in
discriminately, and they all appeared healthy,
clean, and comfortable, and as far as I could
judge the concern seemed to be well conducted.

After having satisfied myself with the sights
of Richmond — its commanding situation on
the banks of James river ; its State house on
the rising ground to which the city extends ;
its bridges of singular construction ; its theatre
and court-house ; its wharves, canal, and large
basin in the centre of the town ; and above

WASHINGTON. 103

all its statue of Washington of the most chaste
design and elegant workmanship, — I took my
departure at six o'clock A. M. on the 24th of
June, for Washington, and arrived there about
four afternoon.

Owing to the sitting of Congress, Washington
was much crowded, but I was fortunate in placing
myself comfortably at the lodging house of
Mrs Hamilton in Pennsylvania Avenue, which
I shall when opportunity serves cordially re
commend to any of my friends who may have
occasion to visit Washington. Mrs Hamilton
is of Scotch extraction, and her daughter, a
very interesting young lady, seems to have a
strong partiality for everything connected with
Scotland, and regarding it put many questions
to me, which my amor pa-trice was gratified
in hearing and answering.

Next morning I called on Mr Greig of Ca-
nandaigua, who kindly took me to the Ca
pitol, a noble edifice of the most elegant pro
portions and workmanship, containing the two
houses or chambers of the legislature, with the
courts of law and the offices belonging to each,

104« SENATE.

and adorned exteriorly with domes and stately
columns, and interiorly with many valuable
paintings and statues, among them, of course,
a portrait and statue of the illustrious Wash
ington.

I heard some speeches in the House of Re
presentatives on the M'Leod affair ; the ora
tors delivered themselves fluently and clearly,
and with considerable eloquence, and from
what I heard, I should set them down as
speakers superior to many who make a figure
in our House of Commons.

After having been also in the Senate, I was
taken by Mr Greig to wait upon the Presi
dent of the United States, Mr Tyler, who
rose from the office of Vice-President by the
unlocked for death of General Harrison. The
President resides in a handsome house, pro-
vided by the nation, commanding a fine view
of the Potomac river. Mr Tyler is a man of
slender figure, of middle age, plainly dressed,
and of a keen intelligent countenance ; and I
must say, speaking literally, that he received
me " very graciously.**

MOUNT VERNON. 105

Finding I was only seventeen miles from
Mount Vernon, once the residence and now
the resting-place of the great Washington, I
felt it would be a reproach to return home
without visiting his tomb. Accordingly on
the morning of the 28th of June, I left Wa
shington by the steamer, and after a sail of
seven miles, disembarked at Alexandria, a
town of considerable importance, and from
thence with a party of strangers, on the same
errand with myself, proceeded in a stage for
Mount Vernon, a distance of ten miles.

The first five miles led through a fine cul
tivated country, and I there saw, for the first
time, a field of wheat in stooks ; the crop ap
peared to be light. The remaining five miles
were entirely through a copse forest ; the soil
light and sandy, and the road as usual abo
minable.

Mount Vernon is a house of moderate size,
of the description of a gentleman's country
house of the old English style. It is now in
habited by the widow of Judge Washington,
nephew of the General, and strangers are not

106

WASHINGTON S TOMB.

admitted to view the interior. The place ap
pears to be completely neglected, and the on
ly thing worthy of observation is a small gar
den with a few orange and lemon trees which
were planted by the hand of Washington.

That Washington latterly turned his mind
to agriculture and the improvement of his
landed estate, appears from his correspondence
with Sir John Sinclair, but of any improve
ments he actually accomplished no vestige re
mains ; the land has been allowed to return to
a state of wild nature, and is now a mere
copse forest.

The remains of Washington and of his wi
dow are contained in stone coffins or sarcopha-
guses, deposited side by side in an arched
mausoleum, and inscriptions on them tell that
he died in 1799, at the age of sixty-seven, and
she in 1802, at the age of seventy-one.

Standing by the tomb of Washington, it is
with a feeling of profound veneration, that one,
even of the country over which he so signally
triumphed, looks back to his history — to the
generosity of his nature — the energy of his

REGARD TO HIS MEMORY. 107

mind — the vastness of his undertaking — the
arduous struggle he maintained — the result
which crowned it and immortalized his name ;
and perhaps, more than all, the rare magnani
mity with which at last, after having establish
ed the independence, and become the gover
nor of a great nation, he voluntarily relinquish
ed power and retired into private life. It is
no wonder then, we find that it is with the
most ardent devotion Americans regard his
memory, and that monuments in honour of it
are made to adorn their cities, and his por
traits and statues their public halls and pri
vate buildings.

On my return to Washington about six
o'clock, I called on my friend Mr Greig to
take leave, and after I had been with him for
an hour or two, we parted with a lasting sense
of his kindness on my part, and with an assur
ance from him of a continuance of friendship,
with which I could not but feel highly gratified.

108 BALTIMORE.

CHAPTER XIII.

Departure from Washington — Country between it and
Philadelphia — Arrival there — Head's Mansion-House
— Mr Cope — Drive with him to the country — Visit to
Mr SheafF s farm — Superiority of his management —
Crops secured in barns — Objections to that mode-
Excellence of his barns — Garden and orchards — His
place for sale — Mr and Mrs Tyson — Water-works-—
Penitentiary — Gerard's College — Chinese museum —
Mr Cadwallader's fast-trotters — Secretary of Anti
quarian Society — Draft of Deed of Independence —
Departure from Philadelphia.

June 1841.

ON the 27th of June at six A. M. I left
Washington — at nine arrived at Baltimore,
and after breakfast set out for Philadelphia,
distant ninety miles.

For the first sixty miles we passed through
a poor sandy country chiefly in copse. In
deed as in America the railways are generally
conducted through the flattest and least va-

APPEARANCE OF COUNTRY. 109

luable land, they do not always afford to tra
vellers a favourable view of the country; and al
though in the present case another line passes
through a district which is highly cultivated, I
learnt this too late for my purpose.

I had often been told that the finest coun
try in all the States is that which widely sur
rounds Philadelphia, and my belief of this was
now agreeably confirmed, for certainly nothing
could exceed in richness or be imagined finer
than the country we traversed the remaining
part of our way from Baltimore. The land is
of exceeding fertility, almost entirely in mea
dow of beautiful verdure, laid out in fields of
about 100 acres, here neatly enclosed with
post and rail, there with luxuriant hedges,
while numerous elegant mansions, smart vil
las, and fine trees plentifully scattered as in
the great English parks, complete the picture.
Such was the country through which we pas
sed for thirty miles, up to the city of Phila
delphia.

The stock grazing here was in point of con
dition of a superior kind, and included many

110 PHILADELPHIA.

large heavy bullocks ; but blood or pedigree
seemed to have met with no attention, the
animals being apparently of various breeds,
some of them resembling the Lancashire.

We arrived at Philadelphia about three
o'clock, and as recommended by Mr Greig, I
took up my quarters at " Head's Mansion
House," where I found all the comforts of
a first-rate hotel — Head himself a good re
semblance of the " John Bull" landlord, fond
of sporting ; his house conducted in the
English style — frequented by good society —
and free from the usual nuisance of a public
bar. He and three sons, strapping young
fellows who assist him, are sedulous in atten
tion to his guests, and strangers visiting Phi
ladelphia need desire no better cheer or ac
commodation than is to be found in Head's
" Mansion House."

I had brought letters of introduction to se
veral families, chiefly of the Society of Friends,
and after I had partaken of a good dinner, and
some good port wine — the latter by the by
rather a rarity in the States — I called with a

SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. Ill

letter from Joseph John Gurney, on Friend
T. P. Cope, a leading merchant in Philadel
phia.

As the great-great-grandson and lineal de
scendant of " the Apologist," I found my ap
pearance in the great Quaker city hailed as a
sort of event, and welcomed with kindness and
hospitality, and nowhere more cordially than
in the family of Friend Cope in whom I was
happy to meet a person much looked up to by
all classes, for his integrity, kind-heartedness
and benevolence. He is now a man of seven
ty — has been eminently successful in the
world — is of frank and easy manners, and pos
sessing extensive information, has the rare
talent of communicating it mingled with amus
ing anecdote — altogether'Jie is the most cheer
ful of the cheerful — a noble instance of a well
spent life. His spouse, dressed more in the
primitive simplicity of the Quakers, than
any one I had yet seen in the States, evinces
much of the kindness and affability peculiar to
females of that persuasion.

Friend Cope no sooner learnt that my chief

DRIVE TO COUNTRY.

object was to see the country, than he ordered
his phseton and drove me out a circuit of ten
or twelve miles by the Schuylkill river, over
a portion of country which for richness is, to
say the least, equal to the finest parts of Lin
colnshire. It consists of alluvial soil chiefly
in meadow covered with bullocks, but partly
in tillage, bearing wheat and Indian corn, and
partly also devoted to the culture of vege
tables for the supply of Philadelphia. The
average value of such land I understood to be
about 250 dollars or L. 50 per acre.

After a delightful drive, I returned to
Friend Cope's, where I spent the evening.
Next morning, the 28th, after breakfast, in
consequence of an appointment he had kindly
made for me, I accompanied him on a visit to
the farm of a Mr Sheaff, about fourteen miles
from the city.

We again passed over a charming country,
and through a town called Germantown, five
miles in length, but the houses, which gene
rally have gardens in front, very straggling j

MR SHEAFF'S FARM. 113

and about one o'clock we drove up to Mr
SheafFs mansion.

He very readily and obligingly undertook
to show me his farm. It consists of 300
acres, and I at once discovered from the ap
pearance of the land that he manages in a su
perior style. His crops are wheat, rye, Indian
corn, oats, potatoes and clover, with a small
portion of pasturage, all cultivated in a master
ly manner, and the land particularly clean.

Mr Bloomfield, one of the Earl of Leices
ter's principal tenants, and, of course, a crack
farmer, who visited here three or four years
ago, was greatly taken with Mr SheafFs agri
cultural operations, and declared that his farm
exhibited, in his opinion, the only instance of
anything approaching a regular English sys
tem of husbandry he had met with in the
States.

Mr SheafPs crops of wheat are now ready to
be mowed, and although their appearance is very
fine, he tells me he seldom averages more than
thirty bushels per acre ; that over the whole of

114 INDIAN CORN.

the States the average is not greater, and that
the minimum is as low as fifteen bushels.

In my observations on Mr Marx's farm
near Richmond, I have suggested probable
causes and remedies for this apparent defi
ciency of produce in the American wheat
crops. The objections do not altogether ap
ply to Mr SheafFs management, because with
him I witnessed the great rarity of a mound
of from 300 to 400 tons of excellent manure,
in itself a proof of his superior practice ; but
I have reason to doubt whether even he allows
his land a sufficiency of manure — that import
ant article in wheat husbandry — and whether
also his wheat crops might not be rendered
more productive by an increase of the allow
ance of seed.

His crop of Indian corn was to me an object
of peculiar interest ; planted in rows in the us
ual manner, the land on which it grows has been
kept as clean as any garden ; it rises to the
height of eight or nine feet, and the hotter the
weather the more rapid its growth, Friend
Cope having informed me that he has watch-

WINTERING STOCK. 115

ed and measured the progress of the Indian
corn plants, and found in the very hottest
weather that they make shoots of three and
four inches in twenty-four hours.

Indian corn ground into meal and mixed
with cut clover-hay, is used for stall-feeding cat
tle, and I understand with great efficacy. The
cultivation of that corn supersedes here the use
of green crops as food for stock ; but it seems
a question meriting the consideration of the
American farmer whether the culture of tur
nips, and also of potatoes more extensively
than is practised — both, of course, being stor
ed before winter — should not be adopted as fa
cilitating the means of converting straw into
manure.

Not having had experience of an American
winter, I may not presume to determine whe
ther stock may here be kept loose in a yard
communicating with open sheds, and there sup
plied with turnips, or potatoes, or other green
food, and with plenty of fodder and litter, ac
cording to what in Scotland is practised with
great advantage ; but if this may be done, and

116 HAY HARVEST.

I can see no impracticability in it, it is obvi
ous it would give the States farmer a command
of manure within his farm equal to his occa
sions. At all events, there should certainly
be no difficulty in tying up the whole of his
young stock, or stock not put up for fattening,
in close sheds, and there treating them in the
manner mentioned — thus not only keeping
them much better than is consistent with the
existing cruel mode of treating them during
winter, but also making them, so to speak, ma
nufacturers of much valuable manure.

Besides, I should say the occasional use of
turnips or potatoes or other succulent food, al
ternately with the meal of Indian corn, and
cut clover-hay, would be beneficial in exciting
and keeping alive the appetite of the stall-fed
cattle, and of consequence accelerating their
fattening.

Mr SheafFis now in the midst of harvesting
his hay which in some of his fields consists
entirely of clover ; in others a mixture of
clover and Timothy-grass, which he tells me is
much prized as food for horses. I should

CLIMATE. 117

think an admixture of rye-grass and some of
the other approved hay grasses, would be found
still an improvement.

Between this country and ours the difference
of climate is very striking — here, in two days
after it is cut, the clover crop is in a safe state
for being carted home and stored in the barn ;
with us the precariousness of hay harvest, not
only in Scotland, but in the better climate of
England, is too well-known ; here no descrip
tion of crop, grain or hay, is ever stacked ; all
is at once stored in large barns ; with us, if
such a practice were attempted, the buildings,
in all probability, would very soon be burnt
down by the spontaneous combustion of the
contained mass.

But although in the States, the climate ad
mits of this mode of securing the crops in barns,
I should not approve of it even there, as be
sides various other disadvantages, it must
create waste and confusion in thrashing, par
ticularly where thrashing-mills are used, which
however it is surprising to see is but rarely the

118 RICK-YARD.

case in the States, notwithstanding the com
plaint of the high price of labour.

The British farmer takes a pride in the ar
ray of his rick-yard, the number and symme
try and arrangement of his corn- stacks being
signs of his merit ; and this matter, trifling
as it may appear, enters influentially into that
emulation among farmers, to which much of
our advancement in agricultural science is
owing.

But the rick-yard is further of utility in en
abling the farmer to keep an exact account of
the produce of each particular field on his farm,
so as to test the comparative fertility of each ;
or the quality and value of the seed with which
it was sown ; or the efficacy of different ma
nures, or of distinct modes of culture. For
these purposes he has a map of his rick-yard,
on which the sites of the stacks are numbered,
with reference to entries in his farm-book of
everything he desires to record as to the ori
gin, the contents, and the disposal of each
stack. These are matters of importance to
a farmer who has any desire to know what

4

RICK-YARD. 119

he is doing, but they are beyond the reach of
any one who huddles his crops higgledy-pig
gledy in a great barn.

I do not conceive that there is anything in
the climate of America to prevent the secur
ing of either hay or corn crops in stacks. An
inspection of the rick-yard of any good farmer
in England or Scotland, and more particularly
perhaps in Northumberland, Berwickshire or
East Lothian, would be sufficient to remove
every doubt of the practicability of keeping
corn and hay in stacks with perfect safety ; and
if any American farmer would engage a man
from any one of these localities, to stack his
crops, he might depend upon its being done in
such a manner as to resist any rains or storms
that would not penetrate or demolish his barns.

Mr Sheaff has two barns, each of large di
mensions and very handsome. In one of
them are contained his stables and feeding
stalls, in the latter of which he can tie up nine
ty head of cattle to be fattened. This part
of the building is particularly well arranged ;
it is sixteen feet wide, having a stall, a large

1'20 GARDENS.

manger and a hay-rack for each animal ; it is
paved with wood, and having just been white
washed, appears as neat and clean as any gen
tleman's stable.

The only stock I saw here were a few dairy
cows, of no distinct breed ; but Mr Sheaff says
he has grazing at some distance a herd of short
horns which he describes as first-rate. We
were however so oppressed with heat, the ther
mometer standing at 95° in the shade, that no
one of the party was inclined to undertake the
walk to their pastures.

Mr Sheaff has a garden and several fine or
chards ; in speaking of which, I may notice
that making out a garden in the States, occa
sions no expense in comparison with what a gar
den costs with us ; no walls or forcing houses
are required, as grapes, peaches, and every de
scription of fruit ripen here on standards in the
open air. The Americans however, probably
just from the very facility of creating them,
do not seem to take much interest or pleasure
in their gardens, and Mr Sheaff Js was the best
I had seen.

PRICE OF LAND.

We adjourned to dinner at three o'clock, and I
was introduced to Mrs Sheaffand four daughters,
all very agreeable ladies, and a son, a promis
ing young man who now takes the chief man
agement of the farm, was also present.

Mr Sheaff wishes to dispose of this property
for which he asks 7<5,000 dollars, being at the
rate of about L.50 per acre. The mansion-house
is large and commodious, commanding a fine
view over a rich country, and the grounds
round the mansion are laid out with taste, and
neatly kept. The land is in a high state of
cultivation, the effect of good management ;
and upon the whole Mr Sheaff 's is a nice com
pact small property, with every convenience
for a family ; but the soil is not naturally ex
cellent, and if it were not treated, as it has
been, in a judicious manner, it might soon de
cline.

Whether the price asked be over or under
the value, I will not take upon me to say,
but I may mention that Mr Sheaff informs me
that he is able to dispose of 100 tons of hay
annually, the return for which defrays all out-

122 PHILADELPHIA.

lays on the farm, the rest of the crops sold, as
well as what is cleared by stock, going for
profit.

We took leave of that gentleman with on
my part a feeling of obligation for his polite
attention, and returned to Philadelphia. I
spent the evening at Friend Cope's, and there
met his daughter and her husband Mr Tyson,
a gentleman of the legal profession — he a very
pleasant man, and she possessing all the lively
humour and amiable qualities of her worthy
father.

Part of the 29th I devoted to calling and
delivering letters of introduction I had brought
with me, but I found several of the Friends
had left town for the summer, and that others
were not at home.

The rest of the day was spent in walking
through and viewing the city, and in the
evening I received from Mr George Cadwal-
lader, son of General Cadwallader, to whom I
had a letter from George Barclay — a note in
viting me to dine with him next day.

Mr Cadwallader having fixed next morning,

PENITENTIARY. 123

the 30th, for showing me some of the sights
of Philadelphia, called accordingly, and we
drove first to the water-works, a stupendous
achievement of art and labour, by which a
great body of water from the Schuylkill river
is forced by the power of three immense wheels,
driven by the current, to the summit of a hill
overtopping the highest houses, and is there
received into three large reservoirs, out of
which, by means of pipes, it is plentifully dis
tributed over the city, at a moderate charge to
the inhabitants. The sight of this gigantic
work so indicative of great ingenuity and en-
terprize filled me with astonishment.

We next drove to the Penitentiary or State-
prison, a great and admirable establishment,
containing separate cells and airing-yards for
500 prisoners, arranged so as to be all within
view from a hall in the centre, but so also that
one prisoner is not within sight of hearing of
another.

The principle of this establishment is soli
tary confinement, and every prisoner is sup
plied with work such as he can perform, and if

PHILADELPHIA.

ignorant of a trade is taught one. No one
sentenced to a shorter imprisonment than two
years is received here, and although the sen
tence may be for life, imprisonment, the go
vernor tells me, is seldom continued in any case
beyond ten years.

Every prisoner on his arrival is conducted
blindfold to his cell, from which, or the airing-
yard attached to it, he never emerges till his
sentence is fulfilled ; he never sees the face of
another prisoner, and no one but officers of the
establishment is ever allowed to see him.
When his appointed term of imprisonment
terminates, he is furnished with a sum of mo
ney, part of his own earnings in prison, to en
able him to follow an honest calling, and hav
ing been kept in solitary confinement, all along
unseen by any one, if he now chooses to re
move to where he was previously unknown,
the secret of his imprisonment may lie in his
own breast.

Some such provision is a great desideratum
in our own prison-system, according to which,
however much a criminal may have reformed

GIRARD'S COLLEGE.

in his confinement, and however desirous to
pursue a virtuous course when it is ended, he
finds on his return to the world, that he car
ries along with him an indelible stigma which
proves a bar to his exercise of honest industry,
and leaves him no choice but a return to his
former vicious habits.

We next visited Girard's College, a magni
ficent marble edifice, not yet completed, which
in dimensions will surpass the College of Edin
burgh, and in splendour of architecture will, it
is said, equal any building in the world. The
founder was a Mr Girard, a Frenchman, who
from obscurity and poverty, rose to be a great
banker in Philadelphia, and. bequeathed a for
tune of about a million and a half Sterling, for
the erection and endowment of this College.

It is about eight years since the building of
it was commenced, and some years may yet
be required for its completion. Some rather
whimsical conditions disqualifying certain de
scriptions of persons from being appointed pro
fessors, are expressed in the founder's will, but
so ample is the endowment of the institution,

126 PHILADELPHIA.

that eminent men of science and literature
will no doubt be found ready to become the
teachers in it.

From Girard's College we went to what is
called the Chinese Museum — a very remark
able collection of curiosities, comprehending
birds, quadrupeds, shells, and other subjects of
natural history, peculiar to China, with full-
length figures in wax, said to be correct like
nesses of some of the Imperial family and emi
nent characters of that country. The proprie
tor of this museum had been long resident in
China, and having become a favourite with
his celestial Majesty, was allowed to make
this collection — a sort of privilege which had
never before been granted to any barbarian.

After having visited various other public
works and objects of interest, I proceeded at
five o'clock to dinner at Mr Cadwallader's,
where there was an agreeable party. That
gentlemen possesses a large landed estate in
Maryland ; is a great sportsman, a crack shot,
and owns two of the fastest trotting horses in
the States, or perhaps in any country — one of

ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY.

them can do the mile in two minutes thirty
seconds.

After dinner Mr Cadwallader sent me in
his carriage to Mr Tyson's, where I met Mr
Cope and other Friends^ and passed the even
ing.

Next morning, July 1st, I breakfasted with
the Secretary of the Antiquarian Society of
Philadelphia — a singular personage now near
ly ninety years of age, yet hale and strong in
body, and entire and vigorous in intellect ; he
is an enthusiast in antiquarian research, and
showed me many documents upon which great
value is placed — particularly the original draft
of the Deed of Independence in 1776» with
the corrections, erasures, and additions that
were made upon it, in the course of its mo
mentous discussion. I regretted that I was
not sufficiently versed in antiquarian lore, ful
ly to enjoy what to many a one would have
proved a rich treat.

I this day took leave of Philadelphia, the
metropolis of Pennsylvania, a country which
only 200 years ago — a short period in the his-

128 PHILADELPHIA.

)

tory of nations — was, in its forest state, taken
possession of by Europeans — not by the force
of war, but by peaceful negociation and agree
ment with its indigenous occupiers ; it now
appears one of the fairest portions of the earth,
rich in everything that pertains to civilized life,
and for nothing more remarkable than this
great and beautiful city, in its many benevo
lent institutions proclaiming the philanthropy
of its founder William Penn, and in its neat
ness, order, and decorum, owning the influ
ence of that excellent Society of which he was
a distinguished member.

In leaving Philadelphia, I should be defi
cient in gratitude were I not to acknowledge
that to the kind friends I found there, and par
ticularly to T. P. Cope and his family, I feel
myself under obligations for their attentions,
which never can be erased from my remem
brance.

NEW YORK. 129

CHAPTER XIV.

Return to New York through East Jersey — Anniversary
of American Independence — Exemplary behaviour of
the assemblage — Jubilee suddenly terminated by a
terrific thunderstorm — Visit to Glover Farm New
Jersey — Departure from New York — Arrival at Bos
ton — Dinner on board Britannia Steamer, and pre
sentation of plate to Captain Cleland — Concluding
observations on the United States — Departure from
Boston — Return to Liverpool — Unprecedented rapi
dity of the voyage.

July 1841.

IN travelling by railway from Philadel
phia to New York, I passed through East
Jersey, €i light and sandy soil, but well culti
vated according to the usual American system.
At twelve at night I reached New York, and
put up at an excellent house, the Globe, in
Broadway.

While in New York, on this occasion, I had

130 NEW YORK*

an opportunity of witnessing the celebration
of the 4th of July, the birth-day of American
Independence.

The anniversary happened this year to fall
on a Sunday, and the festivities were therefore
postponed till the Monday, but yet on the
evening of Saturday, partial demonstrations
of joy by groups of people on the streets, an
nounced the coming jubilee.

At an early hour on Monday it burst forth
in all the " pomp and circumstance" with
which public rejoicings in a great city are
usually manifested. For the time, business
appeared to have been laid aside in every quar
ter, and countless multitudes of all classes, ci
tizens of New York and inhabitants of the ru
ral districts for many miles around, thronged
the streets from morning to night, eager in
mutual gratulation, and having their gladden
ed spirits still more enlivened by the ringing
of bells, the flying of colours, the roaring of
cannon, and the more dulcet sounds of music
issuing from numerous bands stationed at dif
ferent places, or accompanying processions to

ANNIVERSARY OF INDEPENDENCE. 131

or from meetings at which orations were made
in honour of the day.

I walked much about beholding the animat
ed scene, with no other inconvenience than
the difficulty of threading my way through so
dense an assemblage, and I think it deserving
of particular remark, that in this congregated
mass of many tens of thousands, I saw no per
son intoxicated, witnessed no quarrelling or
disorder, nor heard an angry expression direct
ed from one to another.

Whether this arose from the exhilarating
nature of the occasion, disposing every mind
to none but the more kindly feelings, or was a
consequence of the temperament of the Ameri
can people, distinguishing them from those of
countries in which drunkenness and outrage
are the too certain attendants on such conven
tions, I do not pretend to determine ; but I
am very sure that in my own country, a pro
miscuous congregation of the people, much
less numerous than what I this day saw in
New York, would not readily pass over with-

NEW YORK.

out many quarrels and broken heads, or pro
bably more serious occurrences.

It had been announced that in the evening,
according to custom, grand displays of fire
works were to be exhibited at different places
of amusement, and about ten o'clock, the people,
still not sensibly diminished in numbers, were
moving anxiously towards the expected exhi
bitions, when a terrible thunderstorm burst
over the city, and suddenly terminated the
day's proceedings.

It was full moon, and the street lamps had
not been lit. In a moment the city was en
veloped in a cloud of such intense darkness,
that, walking home from where I had been
dining, I should hardly have found my way
but for those incessant flashes of the most vivid
lightning that ushered in continuous peals of
deafening thunder. The rain then descended
in torrents, the streets were instantaneously
deserted, and thus, by a terrific convulsion of
nature, was closed, in New York, the sixty-
third anniversary of American Independence.

I remained here until the 14th, during

NEW JERSEY. 133

which time nothing farther occurred deserv
ing notice, except that I one day crossed over
to New Jersey, with a view to a purchase for
my daughter, of a farm thirty miles in the in
terior, which I understood was for sale. It is
called Glover Farm, having formerly belonged
to a Colonel Glover, but is now the property
of a Mr Grieve, formerly a Fifeshire farmer
and cattle-dealer, whom I had often met in
Scotland, and who on my appearance now at
his house, betrayed as much surprise as if I
had dropped from the clouds.

I found an excellent stone and brick built
house, containing a hall, two large public
rooms, and eight or ten bed-chambers — situate
on an eminence with a neat garden in front —
and more resembling a gentleman's house in
Scotland than any I had remarked in this coun
try. The property consists of 169 acres of
arable land, and 99 in wood — the soil light
and gravelly, and by no means in good order.
The crops were light and consisted of wheat,
Indian corn, oats, and clover, with thirty acres
in meadow. A few dairy cows was all the

134 NEW YORK.

stock on the farm. On the whole the place
was desirable enough, having a small clear river
within a quarter of a mile of the house, well
supplied with trout, and two ponds stocked
with fish, and there being on the estate, as I
was informed, plenty of quail, woodcock, snipe,
and other game. The distance from Newark
is six miles, and Newark is distant by the rail
way twenty-four miles from Jersey city on the
riverside opposite to New York, and the neigh
bourhood of extensive lead mines, Mr Grieve
told me, affords him a ready market for farm
produce. But 13,000 dollars, the price de
manded, I considered above the value of the
property, which only three years ago was pur
chased for 10,000.

Having passed ten days at New York much
to my satisfaction, and chiefly with my rela
tives, Messrs George and Anthony Barclay,
who had proved my sheet anchor, and with
out whose kind interposition I should have
been indeed a stranger in the land, I returned
by steamer to Stonnington, and from thence
by railway to Boston, where I arrived on the

BOSTON, 135

morning of the 15th, exactly ten weeks from
the day on which I landed there from Liver
pool.

I found the Britannia Steamer now at Bos
ton, and was heartily welcomed by Captain
Cleland and Lieutenant Roberts. The same
day I attended a dinner on board and wit
nessed the presentation to the Captain of a
piece of plate to which, along with my fellow
passengers from Liverpool, I had cheerfully
subscribed, as an acknowledgment of our sense
of his kind and polite attention, and the sea
manship and discipline displayed by him on a
voyage for the greater part so extremely bois
terous as that which in April and May we
performed with him to Halifax.

Now on the eve of bidding farewell to Ame
rica, I must express the high gratification I
have derived from my visit to that great, ris
ing, and most interesting country, the ad
vancement of which in power and riches, is,

136 AGRICULTURE.

J

with reference to the period that has inter
vened since it ranked as an independent state,
or even looking back to the very dawn of its
civilization, perhaps unparalleled in the his
tory of nations.

It has not been my province to speak of its
extensive commerce, or its growing manufac
tures. Its agriculture was the chief object of
my attention, and in that I have seen an im
measurable source of wealth, naturally attract
ing much of the capital and a vast proportion
of its own population, and affording also an
alluring invitation to the inhabitants of other
countries, and more especially the British
farmer.

That there is much room for improvement
in the practice of American agriculture, I have
endeavoured in some respects to point out ;
and it is an important and encouraging consi
deration, that the defects calling for remedy in
a great measure proceed from the excellence
of the soil and climate, which, operating so
spontaneously in production, have as yet left
in abeyance those exertions which, as is exem-

BRITISH HUSBANDRY. 137

plified in other countries, a less fertile soil and
a more ungenial climate, would have drawn
forth, it having been well expressed by a cele
brated agricultural writer, that where nature is
bountiful, man is too apt to be indolent.

If I might presume to address, and could
imagine my advice would reach, the landed
proprietors of the States, I would impress upon
their attention the advantages to be derived
from an observance of the modes of husbandry
which, with the aids of science, and after long
experience, have been established in Britain,
both as regards the cultivation of land and the
breeding and rearing of stock.*

This is a matter of more concernment to
American farmers than many of them seem
aware of, for, although from the great natural
richness of their soil, and, in the general case,
its recent subjection to culture, it may as yet
exhibit but few signs of exhaustion, it cannot

* Vide Reports of Counties of England and Scotland
drawn up for the Board of Agriculture ; also " Code of
Agriculture," and other valuable agricultural works by
Sir John Sinclair.

M

138 FOREST LAND.

I

be supposed that, under a system of over-crop
ping, or as in Scotland it is emphatically
termed a scourging system, it will not at
length give way, and when its impoverishment
once takes place, they may be assured it will
be a matter very difficult, or it may be im
practicable, to restore it to anything like ori
ginal fertility.

This observation more particularly applies
to land which has been reclaimed from forest.
Alluvial soil by deeper and deeper ploughing
may be kept in a productive state for a longer
time, and when it sickens, as sicken it must,
from constant working without feeding, it may
perhaps be revived by stimulating manures, or
by being laid to rest for a sufficient time un
der grass. Even in this case, prevention be
ing better than cure, it were unwise to dete
riorate the soil by overcropping when the
means of preserving its fertility are at hand.

But as to land cleared from forest, the pro
ductiveness of it seems to depend entirely on
a covering of vegetable earth, which, in its forest
state, had, for perhaps thousands of years, been

FOREST LAND. % 139

forming and accumulating on its surface, and
of which the fertility is so great, that but little
labour and no manure is required to make it
bear, year after year, abundant crops of grain.
Every successive crop, however, abstracts a
portion of the vegetative principle the soil con
tains, and in a certain time, longer or shorter,
according to the thickness of the covering, it
will be entirely deprived of its vivifying pow
ers, and reduced to a caput mortuum. Whe
ther after this, the land may be of any use, will
depend on the quality of the subsoil, and how
ever naturally rich the subsoil may be, it will
before it will carry crops of grain have to be
fertilized by being brought to the surface and
fed with proper manure. How much better
then must it be, by a right mode of cultiva
tion, to maintain the present valuable surface
soil in its fruitful state.

There is not in the States, as there is in
Britain, that peculiar feeling of the amor pa-
trice which attaches a man to a particular loca
lity, and probably induces him to use means
for establishing it as the home of his descen-

140 MIGRATORY PROPENSITY.

dants. In the former country the abnegation
of the law of primogeniture in a manner pre
cludes the establishment of family estates,
and land is so universally an article of com
merce, that to ask a gentleman to sell his house
and land, is just as permissible as it were in
England to ask a dealer to sell a horse.

Hence, perhaps, arose a migratory propen
sity, observable in the generality of persons
engaged in the business of agriculture, and
hence the difficulty of reconciling them to
meliorating modes of husbandry involving
fixedness of residence. The States, many of
them argue, are a wide field, and there is in
them plenty of land to be reclaimed. It will
therefore be long ere it be necessary to take
heed how soils are managed. When one farm
ceases to be profitably productive, another may
be cleared, and economising the fructifying
quality of the soil is therefore a matter not
yet worth consideration. In short, a profit
which is immediate, is the profit wrhich most
of them seek after, and consequently an expen
diture on land, which is to be productive of a

DETERIORATION OF LAND. 141

permanent but only gradual return, is repug
nant to their habits.

To those who are actuated by such views,
it were probably vain to remark, that although
the States are indeed "a wide field," the encrease
of population there is astonishingly rapid — that
the clearing of the forests has already extended so
far as to excite in some quarters an apprehen
sion of a dearth of timber — and that there is
reason to think a great many years may not
elapse before all the reclaimable land shall have
been brought into cultivation.

With a view to the public interests of the
States, it seems, therefore, a matter of serious
importance, that the destruction of land by ir
remediable impoverishment should be prevent
ed. How far this might be accomplished by
the establishment of institutions in the differ
ent States, having for their object the encou
ragement of approved modes of husbandry,
I may not presume to say, but I may refer to
the " Highland and Agricultural Society of
Scotland," as an instance of the immense ad
vantages which a country may derive from a

IMPROVED HUSBANDRY.

general association of its leading men, encou
raging by their own example, and rewarding
by liberal premiums, improvements in the
various branches of rural economy. More re
markable testimony to the benefits diffused by
that Society, could not have been borne, than
has been afforded by its having been taken as
a model for England, in an association lately
established, and now in operation in that
country.

But although it is not difficult to show that
an alteration of the practice of husbandry in
the States, is called for by a regard to the pub
lic advantage, the improvements I would sug
gest for the adoption of the American farmer,
are such as I conceive would not diminish im
mediate profit, but, on the contrary, material
ly encrease it.

The principal error in American cultivation
is the frequent repetition of culmiferous crops,
without the application of a sufficiency of ma
nure to compensate for the matter they abstract
from the soil.

The arable land in those parts of the States

IMPROVED HUSBANDRY. 143

visited by me, is in general a rich friable loam,
or a rich vegetable mould, in both cases such
as, in Scotland, would be deemed peculiarly
adapted for green crops of all descriptions.

On such land, therefore, may successfully
be followed a system of convertible husbandry,
based on a rotation which an experienced far
mer will have no difficulty in adapting to his
peculiar soil, and so arranged that the severity
of grain crops may be modified or counteracted
by the alternation of grass and green crops in
their proper order. Under such a system the
soil would be nourished and supported, by ma
nure used for the green crops, and the green
crops, such as turnips, potatoes, mangel-wurzel,
would be consumed in winter by stock proper
ly foddered and littered, and thus manure in
sufficient quantity, would every year be manu
factured — the land would be kept in good
tilth — stock of greater value would be reared
— and upon the whole, the receipts of the far
mer would be encreased in amount with little
or no additional outlay.

144 CONVERTIBLE HUSBANDRY.

This is not a prediction rested on mere
theory ; for at a period not yet beyond memory,
before the introduction of convertible husband
ry in Scotland, it was nothing uncommon to
see the farmer's stock so attenuated by the
dearth and insufficiency of winter food, as to
be almost unable to walk to their pastures in
spring. But with convertible husbandry came
the cultivation of turnips and other green crops,
before unknown. By the use of such green
crops, the straw came to be converted into va
luable manure ; the soil was rendered greatly
more productive ; and now, at the end of
winter, the stock of a Scotch farmer is not the
mere skin and bone of former times, but in
the best condition, or, if such has been the
purpose, ready for the butcher.

I have already made such observations on the
descriptions of American stock I had opportuni
ties of inspecting, as occurred to me at the mo
ment, and I would here remark that in the man
agement of that branch of farming, there is in
the States, a want of attention to two things of
essential importance — 1st, the selection of

BREEDS OF CATTLE. 145

suitable breeds, and keeping them pure — and,
Qdly, the provision of shelter for stock in
winter.

With regard to breed, where the distance to
market is not considerable, or where fat cattle
may be carried to market, I should think
short-horns the most suitable stock for a
States' farmer, as that breed feeds kindly and
to a great weight, and is of a hardy constitu
tion, and as the soil of the States is amply cal
culated to rear it to perfection.

But of whatever breed he makes choice, he
should be particular as to its purity, both in
the original purchase, and by endeavouring to
preserve it from mixture with other breeds.
Or if from any circumstance he finds a cross
advisable or unavoidable, he should by all
means shun breeding from the cross, other
wise he will soon render his stock wholly
mongrel and comparatively worthless, which
indeed I observed is the case with regard to
the greater part of the American stock I ex
amined. On the other hand there is a disad
vantage in breeding long in families, and this

N

WANT OF LEASES.

may easily be avoided by occasional exchanges,
between neighbours having stock similar in
breed but not related. These I conceive are
fixed rules everywhere, in the proper manage
ment of stock.

But no breed of cattle can possibly thrive,
if not sheltered from inclement weather, and
therefore the practice of exposing stock in
open fields, to the rigour of a North American
winter, must be condemned as beyond mea
sure incongruous, the disadvantages by loss of
manure and injury to the cattle, which arise
from it being incalculable.

Further as indispensable to the introduction
of tenants from Britain, I would to proprietors
who do not farm their own land, but commit
its cultivation partly or wholly to others, reite
rate my recommendation of the adoption of a
judicious system of LEASING.

As far as I could perceive, the common de
scription of rural tenantry in America, are a
sort of contractors, who agree to plough and
crop a portion of land by the year, and to de-

CONTRACTORS. 147

liver in name of rent, a certain portion of the
crop in bulk.

Under this system the land is robbed of the
straw which ought to be converted into ma
nure, and consequently, year by year, must be
come more and more deteriorated ; and at last
finding it has been nearly worked out, and
rendered no longer capable of making him a
due return for his trouble, the contractor
leaves it, and in the wide range of the States,
seeks and readily finds another lot, to be
ploughed and cropped and impoverished in its
turn.

That this system is an improvident one is
very obvious, and it is equally so that the evil
consequences inseparable from it, might be
averted by an arrangement of the land into
proper sized farms, of from 200 to 500 acres,
according to the means of tenants — erecting
upon them suitable buildings both for the ac
commodation of the tenants and for housing
their stock — and granting leases for a term of
years sufficient for ensuring a return of the

148 WANT OF LEASES.

capital which the tenants might lay out in the
improvement of the soil.

I had the satisfaction, in one instance, of
convincing an extensive landowner, Mr Henry
Barclay near Red- Hook, of the advantage to
be derived from granting leases ; and I hope
to hear that he has carried his purpose of
adopting that system into execution. The
encouragement which his locality temptingly
holds out to enterprizing farmers, I have al
ready explained.

But although I succeeded in making but
one convert among the landed proprietors, I
had an opportunity of ascertaining that the
sort of tenantry I have described, are them
selves quite sensible of the disadvantage of
their present tenure, and would be found ready
to embrace the system of leases I recommend.

It is to such a system that in Scotland is
mainly owing those improvements which in
the last sixty years have raised it to eminence
in scientific agriculture, and it cannot be
doubted that its adoption would encrease the

ADVANTAGES OF LEASES. 149

value of land and advance the character of agri
culture in America.

Besides, an important benefit arising from
the granting of leases is that farms are for the
greater part tenanted by men reared from in"
fancy to agriculture — who study it as a pro
fession, and pursue it with the skill and energy
necessary to success. Britain thus possesses
a numerous race who for agricultural know
ledge, patriotic feeling, and moral conduct, are
nowhere surpassed — who are the pride and
glory and decidedly the best bulwarks of their
country.

Under this system of leasing British farmers
would flock to the States, and by the applica
tion of their skill and capital, not only enrich
themselves, but set an example that would
disseminate itself and eventually prove valua
ble to the country. And I do not hesitate to
give it as my decided opinion, that if the land
ed proprietors of the States could be induced
^o adopt that system, farmers emigrating from
Britain, would do better to become their ten-

150 PURCHASING LAND.

ants, than in the first instance to purchase
land.

Where, however, the British farmer is pos
sessed of capital sufficient for the purchase,
and also the stocking and cultivating, of a
farm, he might certainly find his account in
making a purchase in the States. From the
generally moderate price of land and the op-
portunity he would have of reclaiming a fer
tile soil, or by his superior skill, rendering
that which is already reclaimed greatly more
fruitful, he might assure himself of such a re
turn for capital as I believe is not to be had
from agriculture in any other country equally
abounding as the States are in all the comforts-
of life.

But I need hardly observe, that in making
a purchase of a farm, he must take care to re
tain sufficiency of capital for stocking and cul
tivating it, because were he to expend his all
in the purchase, he must from obvious causes,
go to work here with great and peculiar dis
advantage — he might draw from the land a
subsistence for his family, but in all probabili-

PRICE OF LABOUR. 151

ty nothing more, and even that with toil and
difficulty. It is the danger of this inconveni
ence, that induces me to think renting land
is in the first instance safer and more advisa
ble.

It is generally supposed that the high price
of labour in America, operates as a drawback
in the business of farming — but there are com
pensating circumstances which, in the consi
deration of this matter, ought to be kept in
view.

Although the nominal price of a day's la
bour is greater in America than in Britain,
the quantum of labour purchased by it is also
greater.

Thus, at Geneseo, I found a labourer's
wages to be about 3s. per diem, with board
and lodging, but, then, let it be considered
what he gives in return : — he works from sun
rise to sunset, with short intervals for break
fast and dinner — or he ploughs two acres a-
day — or in a day he mows between two and
three acres of wheat, or two acres of clover —
and one man takes charge of as many as 2000

PRICE OF LABOUR.

sheep, in all things but the shearing of them,
which is done by contract. The individual I
found in charge of a flock of that number was
an English shepherd, and the only complaint
he seemed to have was that there was occa
sionally superadded to his task, a call to assist
at farm work.

In this way the real price of labour in
America, is brought nearer its price in Britain,
than at first sight appears ; and accordingly,
by the information I obtained, the expense of
raising an acre of wheat in the free States, is
no more than about L. 3 of our money, which
is considerably less than the same expense, ex
clusive of rent, in any part of Britain.

It is also to be considered that to the price
he pays for labour, the British farmer has to
add taxes and rates far exceeding any imposts
directly or indirectly affecting land in Ameri
ca, and greatly outbalancing any advantage
he can have from any difference in the rate of

wages. *

* In connection with this part of the subject it may
be noticed that it appears by a Report lately delivered to

DRAINAGE. 153

There is one circumstance which renders
cultivation in America an agreeable task, when
we look to the obstacles to it which often oc
cur in Britain, and that is the absence of land-
springs. I did not observe in the States a
single field in which a drain had been formed
or was required, nor, with exceptions not worth
mentioning, any land in the smallest degree
infested with boulder stones. There is thus
in the soil of an American farm no super
abundant moisture to be got rid of, and after
the land has been cleared of timber, nothing
to impede the plough.

It may not be deemed foreign to my pur
pose, in recommending a preference for the
States to my emigrating countrymen, to de
vote a few words to the condition of Ameri
can society.

I had long heard much of the impertinent
curiosity, rudeness, vulgarity, and selfishness
of the people of the States, but instead of any

the House of Commons that in five years, from 1834 to
1839, the average price of wheat was at New York L. 2,
9s. 10d. per quarter, and in England L. 2, 11s.

MANNERS.

extraordinary signs of these repulsive qualities,
I found good breeding, politeness, frank hos
pitality, and every generous feeling prevailing
amongst them, in as great a degree and with
as few exceptions as at home.

In the cities I saw none of the open dis
plays of depravity, which disfigure our large
towns, and in all my journeying I never saw
the face of a policeman — never met a beggar
or any one in the garb of mendicity — never
heard uttered an oath or imprecation — and
never witnessed an instance of intoxication but
one, and that I regret to say was furnished
by a Scotsman. I observed when at Albany,
that the Americans are attentive to their reli
gious duties, and this opinion has been con
firmed by a further acquaintance with them.

One does not meet here with any preten
sion to the high fashion bred in courts and
pervading their atmospheres, but exclude this
from the comparison, and, between the States
and England, there will be found in private so
ciety, such a resemblance of manners as for
the moment makes a Briton forget he is not in

PEOPLE. 155

his own country — or if that shall be called to
his mind, it will probably be by a difference
only in the personal appearance of the natives
of the two countries.

In rural districts this dissimilarity in exte
rior appearance is not so striking as in the ci
ties. But in the latter the men generally are
more sallow, and care-worn, and less robust
than Englishmen — and there also, in the
greater number of females, there is a very ob
vious appearance of languor and delicacy of
frame, while the bloom and vivacity of coun
tenance, the elastic gait and rounded form of
an English beauty, are hardly to be met with.
These distinctive qualities are in America the
effects of climate, heightened in the case of fe
males by the most exemplary domestic habits,
and consequent sedentariness.

It cannot perhaps be said, that in Britain
there is any deficiency of chivalrous bearing
towards the fair sex, but I remarked of Ame
rica that this sort of feeling passes through all
ranks more obviously than I had met with it at
home. Every man here, rich or poor, seems

156 EQUALITY.

on all occasions sedulously to give place and
precedence to females, and the meanest of
them are exempt, or I might rather say de
barred, from those masculine or laborious tasks
which are commonly enough assigned the sex,
or assumed by them, in our country. For in
stance, a woman employed at work in the fields
is nowhere to be seen, and although this with
us might be thought a refinement, it is at least
an amiable one.

Before setting foot on the republican soil of
America, one supposes he is to hear broached
there no sentiment that does not comport with
a veneration for that perfect equality, upon
which the social compact in that country theo
retically is based ; but he has not long mixed
in American society ere he discovers, in many
quarters, a strong aristocratic feeling — in some
the pride of learning, in many the pride of
riches, and in not a few even the pride of fa
mily.

This feeling is easy to be perceived in the
portion of the States I visited, and I under
stand is found much stronger in the more south-

DISTINCTION OF RANKS. 157

ern states. One day, and that perhaps at no
great distance, it is likely to end in an open
and acknowledged distinction of ranks, includ
ing every gradation of precedence from the
humble " labourer" up to the man of quality
and title.

I had formed this impression very soon af
ter my arrival in America, and a few words,
having some reference to the state of society,
which the President did me the honour to ad
dress to me when at Washington, have not
had the effect of effacing it.

In the praise which, on the whole, truth
has compelled me to bestow on the American
States, I do not forget that their greatness is
an emanation from my own country, and that
while she on the one hand may be proud of
her offspring, they on the other hand have rea
son to be proud of their origin. This I be
lieve is the feeling of every well constructed
mind in both countries, and deeply is it to be
regretted that grovelling passions are ever al
lowed to impair that feeling, or to put in jeo
pardy the bonds of mutual friendship, in which

158 CONCLUSION.

a proper sense of mutual interests ought un
ceasingly to unite them.

On Saturday the 17th of July at eleven A. M.
I embarked in the Britannia for Old England,
and arrived at Liverpool at seven p. M. on the
29th, after a passage of twelve days from Bos
ton, and only nine days twenty hours from
Halifax.

On my taking leave of Captain Cleland he
jocosely addressed me in these words :— " You
have now crossed the Atlantic in shorter time
than ever it was crossed since the Atlantic was
the Atlantic, — and you may tack that to the
rest of your feats"

APPENDIX.

APPENDIX.

DINNER

TO

CAPTAIN BARCLAY OF URY,

AT STONEHAVEN.

ON Friday the 6th July 1838, a Public Dinner was
given to Captain ROBERT BARCLAY ALLARDICE of
Ury, in a large granary attached to the Glenury Distil
lery, by about two hundred of the Gentry and Farmers
of the Mearns and adjacent counties. The chair was
filled by John Carnegie, Esq. of Redhall. The crou
piers were— Mr Garland of Cairnton ; Mr Thorn of
Uras ; Mr Hector of Femieflat ; and Mr Scott, Kirk-
town of Benholm. Among the gentlemen on each side
of the chair, besides the distinguished guest, we observ
ed the Right Honourable Viscount Arbuthnott ; Sir
Thomas Burnett of Leys, Bart. ; Sir John Stuart Forbes
of Fettercairn, Bart. ; the Honourable the Master of Ar
buthnott ; William Innes, Esq. of Raemoir ; ,

o

162 APPENDIX.

Innes, Esq. younger thereof ; Robert Duff, Esq. of Fet-
teresso ; G. Silver, Esq. of Netherley, Convener of the
County ; Captain Cheape of Strathtyrum ; Henry Lums-
den, Esq. of Tilwhilly ; Mr Lumsden, yr. thereof ; Alex
ander Gibbon, Esq. of Johnston ; Lewis Crombie, Esq.
of Kirkhill ; Captain Scott, R.N. ; J. B. M'Combie, Esq.
of Jellybrands ; W. M'Combie, Esq. of Easter Skene ;
Mr Sheriff Fullerton ; - - Taylor, Esq. of Cushnie ;

• Innes, Esq. Aberdeen ; Mr Shand, advocate, do. ;

Alexander Hadden, Esq. do. ; Captain Scott, R.N. ; Mr
Blaikie, advocate ; Mr Alexander Gordon, advocate ;
Mr Gordon of Manar ; Mr Mackenzie, yr. of Glack ;
Captain Skene of Lethenty ; Mr Chalmers of Westburn ;
Dr John Campbell ; Mr Peter, Factor to the Earl of
Kintore ; Mr Monro of Berryhill ; Mr Robertson of
Haughhead ; Mr Tindal, Procurator Fiscal of Kincardine-
shire ; Mr Christian, Chief Magistrate of Stonehaven ;
Dr Thomson ; Mr James Brebner, advocate ; Mr Bur-
ness, banker, Stonehaven ; Mr Kinnear and Mr Smart,
solicitors, do. ; Mr Valentine, Bogmuir ; Mr Anderson,
Pitcarry ; Mr Napier, corn merchant ; Dr Fettes ; Mr
David Barclay, North Water Bridge, Montrose, &c. &c.

The Hall was tastefully decorated with evergreens and
flowers. Behind the chair were the Royal Arms and
those of Captain Barclay.

The dinner having been concluded, the Chairman stat
ed that he had received letters of apology from some
gentlemen who were prevented by business and other

APPENDIX. 163

causes from attending. He at the same time congratu
lated the company upon the numerous and respectable
assemblage who had met to do honour to their distinguish
ed guest.

Before the first toast was proposed, several ladies,
among whom were Miss Barclay of Ury, Mrs and Miss
Innes of Raemoir, &e. entered the room, and were greet
ed with loud applause.

The CHAIRMAN then rose, and gave the first toast —
** The Queen" — which was drunk with all the honours.
(Air — God save the Queen.)

" The Queen Dowager, and the rest of the Royal Fa
mily." (Air — Of a noble race was Shenkin.)

" Lord Hill and the Army." (Air — British Grena
diers.)

•** Lord Minto and the Navy." (Air — Rule Britan
nia.)

The CHAIRMAN then rose and called for a special and
overflowing bumper. It was now his grateful duty to
propose the toast of the evening ; and, in the first place,
in the name of himself and the other farmers present, he
must return their united and cordial thanks to their dis
tinguished guest for the readiness with which he had re
sponded to their desire of meeting him here on this occa
sion. (Cheers.) To none were his valuable services
better known than to them — his patriotic character — his
kindness as a landlord — his genuine goodness of heart.
(Loud cheers.) He would not detain them by dwelling

APPENDIX.

upon what they knew so well. He might also allude to
Captain Barclay as the representative of an ancient and
honourable house, and one who, apart altogether from his
success as a farmer, had, by the brilliant incidents in his
career, acquired for himself a name more widely celebrat
ed than that of any other gentleman in Britain. (Cheers.)
But he would now consider him only as the proprietor of
Ury. It was as a resident landlord — as an agriculturist
— that they were met to honour him ; as one, who, shed
ding the influence of his example through the country,
and treading in the steps of his immediate ancestor, had
contributed to raise the agriculture of the country to that
state which had rendered Scotland the best cultivated
country in the world. (Loud cheers.) But if they ow
ed much to Captain Barclay as a farmer, they owed still
more to him as a breeder of live stock. Regardless of
expense, he had introduced into the country a breed of
cattle which was unmatched in Scotland, and unsurpass
ed elsewhere. By crossing the short-horned or Durham
breed with the breed of the country, he had greatly im
proved upon both ; and by his annual sales at Ury, he
had widely disseminated a most splendid herd of cattle.
He had also introduced the valuable breed of Leicester
sheep. The introduction of steam navigation so exten
sively had, by opening up the markets, enabled us fully
to appreciate the benefit derived from the introduction of
a stock which was as valuable at one year old, in flesh
and wool, as the common breed at full age. He would

3

APPENDIX. 165

not longer detain them, but propose the health of " Cap
tain Barclay of Ury." The toast was drunk with all the
honours. (Air — Kind Robin lo'es me.)

Captain BARCLAY rose amidst loud cheers, and said,
— Mr Chairman and Gentlemen — Unaccustomed as I am
to address a large public assembly, I should feel it suffi
ciently embarrassing to do so even on any ordinary occa
sion. You may judge, then, how utterly impossible it is
for me, even were I gifted with the command of lan
guage and eloquence of a Peel or a Brougham, to ex
press, in anything like adequate terms, the feelings which
at this moment pervade my mind. You have conferred
upon me the greatest honour which, in my opinion, a
country gentleman can receive — the spontaneous expres
sion of approbation of his conduct, by the practical far
mers, cordially joined by the landed proprietors and
other kind friends. Gentlemen, I should be paying but
a poor compliment to your judgment, if I did not admit
that I am aware that this mark of your respect has been
caused by your feeling that, by my pursuits and exer
tions as an agriculturist, I have been the means of doing
the country some good service. (Cheers.) If I am
right in this conjecture, the fondest wish of my heart has
been obtained. (Loud cheers.) From my earliest in
fancy my mind was turned to agriculture ; but, in this
pursuit, the path was made easy, by the energy, talent,
and perseverance of a father. Forty-one years have now
passed away since he departed this life, and there are

166 APPENDIX.

)

but few remaining who recollect him, and still fewer who
witnessed his exertions. In the year 1761, he succeeded
to the estate of Ury by the death of my grandfather. At
that period agriculture was at a very low ebb. My
grandfather, although a most respectable man, had no
turn for improvement, nor had any of his predecessors.
Indeed, the pursuit of agriculture was generally despised
through the country. But my father seems to have been
a heaven-born improver ; for such was his enthusiasm,
that a year before his father's death, he carried on his
back, all the way from Aberdeen, a bundle of young
trees, which he planted in the den of Ury with his own
hand, sorely to the vexation of the old gentleman, who
complained that the protecting of the plants annoyed the
people's sheep. (Cheers and laughter.) Soon after this
my father went to Norfolk, then the great agricultural
school of the kingdom, where he served a regular ap
prenticeship to the business, and brought home with him
not only the most improved implements of husbandry,
but also a number of Norfolk ploughmen. (Cheers.)
At that time the tenantry were little better than the boors
of Germany and Russia, and the lairds were more inclined
to break each other's heads than to break up the treasures
of the earth. (Laughter.) Seeing, then, that preaching
doctrines was of no avail without putting them into prac
tical operation, he took into his own hands a large sur
face of about 2000 acres. At that time the estate of
Ury was a complete waste, consisting of bogs, baulks,

APPENDIX. 167

and rigs, everywhere intersected with cairns of stones and
moorland. For twenty years he toiled most indefatigably ;
and during all that time he was never known to be in bed
after five o'clock in the morning, winter or summer. He
was the first man who sowed a turnip in a field, or artifi
cial grasses, north of the Frith of Forth. During this
period he thoroughly improved 2000 acres, reclaimed
from moor 800, and planted from 1200 to 1500 acres
chiefly with forest trees. Gradually his operations be
gan to attract attention, and be followed by the proprie
tors and tenantry around, until at last that spirit of im
provement burst forth, which has placed the agriculture
of this part of the country, and Scotland generally, in the
high state of excellence in which we now find it. (Cheers.)
You thus see that my way was made comparatively easy,
and I had only to perfect and fill up a great outline which
had been drawn for me. My father proceeded on a dif
ferent principle from most other improvers. He com
menced at the far end, for he used to say that " a tired
man would struggle hard to reach home." The conse
quence of this was, that on my accession I found the most
neglected part of the estate to be that near the Mansion
House. I said, " this shall never be ;" and I have now
the satisfaction of saying that the estate of Ury is one of
the most highly improved and beautified estates in the
country. (Cheers.) My next consideration was, how to
turn the means of improvement I possessed to most ad
vantage. About the year 1822, I introduced the breed

168 APPENDIX.

of Leicester sheep and Durham cattle. They have been
eminently successful, and the improvement which has
been effected by crossing these with the native breed of
the country, it is unnecessary for me to dilate upon, as
you are the best judges. (Loud cheers.) I hail this
meeting as a tribute of regard to the memory of my fa
ther, and also as an omen of the high estimation in which
agriculture is held by all classes of persons through the
country ; for there are here assembled not only country
gentlemen and practical farmers, but also those connect
ed with the great trading and manufacturing interests.
(Cheers.) There is one other subject which I feel it
right to touch upon. You are all aware that a few
months ago, it was more than probable, I should have
been called upon to fill a high and important situation
in a distant part of the world. The history of that affair
is this. In 1835, a company of persons received a grant
of land in New Holland, extending to no less than 300,000
square miles, for the purpose of founding a colony. This
colony was established on different principles from any
other, inasmuch as neither slave nor convict labour was
allowed, but the whole labour was performed by free la
bourers and voluntary emigrants. The Commissioners
for the management of this colony first appointed as Go
vernor, Captain Hindmarsh of the Royal Navy ; but it was
soon found that, although a gallant officer, he was per
fectly incapable of taking charge of an infant agricultu
ral colony. Accordingly, about Christmas last, he was

APPENDIX. 169

recalled. Some of my friends applied to me to accept
of the situation. I went to London, where several of my
friends interested themselves greatly in the matter, part
ticularly, I may mention, Dr Crombie of Phesdo. I
found there, that although the Commissioners had nomi
nally the patronage, the appointment was really in the
gift of the Colonial Secretary. My friends made no in
terest whatever with the government ; but on this part of
the business I shall not touch, lest I should draw on any-
think like political discussion. I shall merely say, tha-
after all the arrangements appeared to have been con
cluded, an invisible hand suddenly checkmated the whole
concern. I had, however, on that occasion, the satisfac
tion of receiving the most flattering testimonials from
some of the highest and noblest in the land — from the
Earl of Leicester (better known as the celebrated Mr
Coke of Norfolk), the Duke of Richmond, the Earl of
Aberdeen, and the Viscount of Arbuthnott. The Earl of
Leicester's letter to me says — " I can hardly conceive
any person so eminently qualified to take charge of an
infant agricultural colony as you are." These sentiments
are now corroborated by this expression of your approba
tion. (Loud cheers.) No doubt it would have cost me
a severe pang to have left my native land, if not for ever,
at all events for a considerable number of years ; but I
felt that I had a grand field of enterprise before me —
country twice as large as the British empire, with the
finest soil and climate in the world. I also bore in mind

P

170 APPENDIX.

that I would there have it in my power to be of use to my
friends in this country. There is not the same opening
here for employment that there was forty years ago.
Many farmers also, with large families, find it difficult to
put them out in the world. I had the agreeable feeling
that I should have had the opportunity of lending them
my best assistance. (Loud cheers.) I should certainly
have done so to the utmost of my power. (Continued
cheering.) Gentlemen, the recollection of a dinner may
pass away, but the remembrance of this meeting shall
never pass from my mind, nor from the view of those who
may succeed me. The proceedings of this day will no
doubt appear in the public prints. I shall take care to
have such account framed and glazed, and hung up in the
Hall of Ury, as a proud memorial of the good opinion of
the farmers of the country, and of my kind friends around
me. (Loud and long-continued cheering.) Dinners are
often given as a mark of approbation of particular politi-
.cal sentiments, and for other reasons, but I am not aware
that one like this has ever been given in this country.
(Cheers.) I shall not longer detain you — I feel that I
have encroached too much upon your time already (No,
no) ; but it was impossible for me not to attempt to give
some expression to the overflowings of a grateful mind.
(Captain Barclay sat down amidst loud cheering.)

The Chairman rose and again called for three distinct
rounds of cheers for Captain Barclay, which were given
in the most enthusiastic manner.

APPENDIX. 171

The CHAIRMAN said he had now to propose the health
of a noble Viscount, whom he was proud and happy to see
with them on this occasion — one who was an ornament
to the peerage, and in every respect a perfect model of a
country gentleman. He alluded to the noble Lord on his
right, the Lord Lieutenant of the County. In no county
had her Majesty a more worthy representative, or one
held in greater or better-merited esteem — a feeling which
he was assured would be evinced by the reception given
to this toast. He proposed the health of the " Right
Honourable Viscount Arbuthnott." The health was
drunk with loud applause. (Air — The Reel o' the
Mearns.)

Viscount ARBUTHNOTT returned thanks. He felt
very proud of the compliment which they had paid him,
but at the same time he felt that he did not deserve the
warm eulogium which his friend the Chairman had passed
upon him. It had given him great pleasure to join in
paying this just tribute of respect and gratitude to Mr
Barclay. He would yield to no man in his feeling of re
spect and admiration for his character. (Cheers.)

The ladies having now left the room, amid loud cheering,

Viscount ARBUTHNOTT rose and said, he understood
they had been honoured by the presence of an interesting
lady, who had just left them. He would now propose
the health of " Miss Barclay," Drunk with all the ho
nours. (Air — My Love she's but a Lassie yet.)

Sir THOMAS BURNETT said he had been allowed by

APPENDIX

the Chairman to propose a toast. It was impossible to
suppose, in such a numerous company as this, that they
should be agreed upon every subject ; but there was one
good feeling pervading them all, that of doing honour to
their guest, and he was sure no other feeling would be
allowed to appear. He would propose the health of the
Member for the County, " General Arbuthnott." They
would all agree that no man could discharge his duties
in a more straightforward, honest, and conscientious
manner. Drunk with all the honours. (Air — Chorus
from Massaniello.)

Viscount ARBUTHNOTT returned thanks. No man
would be more gratified to have been present on this oc
casion than General Arbuthnott. He begged to thank
the company and Sir Thomas Burnett for the kind man
ner in which they had drunk his health, and to say that
he felt highly flattered by the compliment paid to his
brother.

The CHAIRMAN. — There was one toast which should
never be omitted in this county, on an occasion of this
kind _ " The memory of the late Mr Barclay." In do
ing honour to the son, they ought not to overlook the
merits of the sire. He had had the vigour of mind to see
through the darkness in which the agriculture of Scotland
was enveloped ; and the fruits of this they were now
reaping — thanks to the present proprietor. He proposed
« The Memory of the late Mr Barclay." Drunk in
solemn silence. (Air — The land o' the leal.)

APPENDIX. 173

The CHAIRMAN. — He had now the pleasure of pro
posing the health of an honourable Baronet present,
whose patriotic character was well known through the
country at large. He was always found at the head of
every great undertaking for the good of the country.
There was one great national association, with which
his name was intimately connected, the Highland and
Agricultural Society of Scotland, of which he was a
most zealous office-bearer. He begged to propose " Sir
John Forbes, and the Highland Society of Scotland."
(Great applause.) (Air — Saw ye Johnny comin'.)

Sir J. S. FORBES said, he was sure if Mr Barclay
laboured under a feeling of embarrassment in addressing
them, they would give him (Sir J. F.) credit for feeling
doubly embarrassed on this occasion. He was much in
debted to his friend, the Chairman, for the kind manner
in which he had proposed his health, and to the com
pany, for the way in which they had received it. The
terms in which he had been spoken of, were, he was con
scious, much more laudatory than his merits at all war
ranted. But, fortunately, his friend had furnished him
with the outlet and loophole, by which to escape from
his embarrassment, by connecting his name with the
Highland Society of Scotland, of which he was treasurer.
He certainly had used his utmost exertions to forward
the great object for which that Society was instituted —
the support of agriculture. He had endeavoured zeal
ously and conscientiously to do his duty. They were

1?4« APPENDIX.

all aware of the benefits which that Society had confer
red. It had been the means of spreading a spirit of im
provement and enterprise through the country. They
all remembered the circumstances which had led to the
origination of the Society. The father of their guest
was the one who had first prompted the friends of agri
culture in Scotland to commence a system which had
done so much good. He was happy to say that the
Society's prospects of usefulness were improving every
year. The results of their Shows at Glasgow, Inverness,
and Aberdeen, held out such promises of support as led
to a reasonable expectation that the resources and useful
ness of the Society would increase tenfold. He was hap
py to say, that at a general meeting in Edinburgh, on
Monday next, there was a list of 172 candidates for ad
mission to be balloted from. (Cheers.) In conclusion,
he begged to return them his best thanks.

Viscount ARBUTHNOTT proposed the health of " Sir
Thomas Burnett," for whom, notwithstanding the differ
ence of opinion between them on some subjects, he en
tertained every respect. (Air — My boy, Tammy.)

Sir THOMAS BURNETT said he was at a loss for
words to express his sense of the kindness of the Noble
Lord and the meeting. Nothing could give him greater
satisfaction than to be present at a meeting of this kind,
where every feeling of hostility was buried, and they
were all united in one object.

The CHAIRMAN proposed the Sheriffs of the County,

APPENDIX. 175

by whom justice was administered, in the most able, im
partial, and successful manner — " Sheriffs Douglas and
Fullerton." (Air — Malbrook.)

Sheriff FULLERTON returned thanks.

Mr INNES of Raemoir said, that in the demonstration
which they had now the pleasure of making, it was na
tural for them to think of the other members of Mr
Barclay's family. He begged to propose the health of
" Mr and Mrs Gurney." He knew them well, and
valued them highly ; and he knew that they cherished
the warmest feelings towards this part of the country.
(Cheers.) (Air — Auld lang syne.)

Captain BARCLAY begged to return his kindest thanks
for the way they had drunk the health of his sister and
her husband. He would take care to make it known to
them, and he knew that nothing could afford them greater
pleasure. Though fate had placed Mrs Gurney in a
distant part of the kingdom, yet he could assure them
that her heart was in her native county. Mr Gurney
was possessed of a princely fortune, which he devoted to
the best purposes. A more charitable and benevolent
individual did not exist.

Viscount ARBUTHNOTT proposed the health of " The
Chairman," and eulogised highly the efficient manner in
which he had discharged the duties of the chair. (Air
— John o' Badenyon.)

The CHAIRMAN returned thanks.

Mr SILVER said, he had to propose the health of a

176 APPENDIX.

noble lady, whose amiable character was so well known,
that he could add nothing to enhance it in their estima
tion — " The Viscountess of Arbuthnott." Cheers. (Air
— The bonniest lass in a' the warld.)

Lord ARBUTHNOTT returned thanks.

The CHAIRMAN proposed the health of " Mr Silver,
the Convener of the County," who was well known as an
eminent and skilful agriculturist. The farmer who ob
tained his opinion in conducting his operations, was ex
ceedingly well off. (Air — The mucking o' Geordy's
byre.)

Mr SILVER returned thanks, and said, that whatever
his opinion was worth, it was always at the service of his
friends.

Mr SCOTT of Benholm proposed " Lord Kintore and
the proprietors of the County." (Air — When our ancient
forefathers agreed wi' the laird.)

Lord ARBUTHNOTT returned thanks. His Lordship
then said, that although there was a proverbial expression
which spoke of " the little men of the Meams," yet the
tenantry of the County would yield to none in respecta
bility and intelligence. He proposed " Prosperity to the
Tenantry of the Mearns." (Air — The lea rig.)

Mr GARLAND returned thanks, and said they felt
very proud of having the company of so many of their
proprietors to assist in offering a small mark of respect
to a distinguished agriculturist.

Mr LUMSDEN of Tilwhilly in terms of high eulogy

APPENDIX. 177

proposed " The Croupiers and Stewards." (Air — There's
three guid fellows ayont yon glen.)

Mr HECTOR returned thanks.

Captain BARCLAY proposed the health of " Lord
Panmure," a nobleman universally known and esteemed
over the whole kingdom. He had enjoyed his acquaintance
for more than thirty years, and although their opinions on
some subjects differed widely, yet that had never occa
sioned a moment's interruption to their friendship. His
Lordship would have been present on this occasion, but
for an accident which he had met with while dispensing his
usual hospitalities during the Trinity Muir Fair. They
knew that, on that occasion, he always kept an open
house — the last was the forty-sixth anniversary on which
he had done so. Captain Barclay then read a letter from
Lord Panmure, expressing his regret at his necessary
absence, and deprecating the allowing of political differ
ences to interfere on such occasions. His Lordship's
health was drunk with loud cheers. (Air — Up and War
them a' Willie.)

The CHAIRMAN, after some observations on the im
provement introduced into the agriculture of the country
by means of bone manure, steam navigation, and tile
draining, said it had been matter of deep regret, that
hitherto tile draining had been little practised among
them, although it was the only effectual means of improv
ing moss and moor land. He was happy to say, how
ever, that this want was now in the way of being supplied.

Q

APPENDIX.

Thanks to the energy of Sir John Forbes — they had
now two brick kilns erected for the manufacture of tiles,
which were likely to pay the projectors, as well as to
confer a most important boon on the country. He con
cluded by proposing " The Plough." (Air — Speed the
Plough.)

Sir THOMAS BURNETT gave " Mr Hadden and the
Manufacturing Interest." (Air — The Rock and the
Wee Pickle Tow.)

Mr HECTOR proposed " Mr Windsor," who had ex
erted himself strongly to assist the Committee to make
their arrangements. (Air — O'er the W^ater to Charlie.)

The CHAIRMAN gave " Prosperity to the Royal Glen-
ury Distillery." He eulogised Mr Barclay as a benefactor
to agriculture, as a magistrate, as a kind master, whose
servants had grown grey in his service — (loud cheers)
— and now they were indebted to him for this distillery,,
which not only afforded the best market for their barley,
but also, as they could testify at this moment, a most de
licious and powerful beverage. If her Majesty could
only have tasted the produce of her own distillery at Glen-
ury, she would undoubtedly have forsworn thin pota
tions, and addicted herself to strong waters. (Laughter.)
They were told, on good authority, that the juice of the
grape rejoiced the heart of man ; the same might have
been said of the barley bree. (Cheers.) (Air — Willie
brew'd a peck o' Maut.)

Captain BARCLAY returned thanks for the high com-

APPENDIX. 179

pliment that had been paid him, and for the honour done
to the partners of the Glenury Distillery. That distil
lery in some measure derived its origin from a suggestion
of his own. He contemplated the advantage that it would
be for the farmers to have a ready market for their bar
ley. The distillery had now been fourteen or fifteen
years in existence, and amidst several vicissitudes, it had
still been able to keep its footing, and it was at present
equal or superior to most distilleries in Scotland. It was
his wish and desire, if it could be done without disadvan
tage, that the farmers in this neighbourhood should have
the preference in getting clear of their grain. The con-
sumpt was now on a large scale, and amounted to about
ten thousand quarters a-year, which must be a material
benefit to the neighbouring country. The spirit itself
had given the greatest satisfaction, and the trade, he had
no doubt, would now go on flourishingly and successfully.
(Cheers.)

The CHAIRMAN gave " The Master of Arbuthnott,"
who was residing among them as a country gentleman,
and was treading in the footsteps of his noble father.
Might he long walk in the path he had selected. (Air
— The bonnie House of Airlie.)

Viscount ARBUTHNOTT returned thanks in the name
of his son, who had by this time left the company.

Captain BARCLAY, in very feeling and appropriate
terms, gave " The Memory of the Duke of Gordon," a
nobleman who had not left his like in the kingdom.

180 APPENDIX.

- j

Drunk in solem silence. (Air — The Flowers of the Fo
rest.)

Sir JOHN FORBES proposed the health of a most de
serving class of men, " The Cottars and Ploughmen of
the Mearns," who were rising in the estimation of the
country, in proportion as new improvements were intro
duced. (Air — Sweet Home.)

The CHAIRMAN gave " The Church of Scotland."
(Air — This is just mine ain house.)

Mr INNES of Raemoir proposed " The Roof-tree of
Fetteresso." (Air — My boy Tammy.)

Mr HADDEN proposed the health of " His Grace the
Duke of Richmond." (Air — Good old English Gen
tleman.)

Mr GARLAND gave " The Grain Merchants of the
District," who were all honest men, and whose money was
as sure as an order on the bank. (Air — Corn Rigs.)

Mr JAMES NAPIER of Stonehaven returned thanks.

The CHAIRMAN gave " The Strangers." (Air —
Blue Bonnets over the Border.)

Captain CHE APE returned thanks.

Mr THOM of Uras gave " The Bar of Stonehaven and
Mr Monro." (Air — Malbrook.)

Mr MONRO returned thanks.

The CHAIRMAN begged to propose a toast to the
" Banking Interests." The time was, when banks were
first established in Scotland, that so ignorant were the
people, that none but Englishmen would take shares, and

APJPEND1X. 181

Englishmen only got situations in them. But now tem-
pora mutantur et nos mutamur in illis ; one-pound
notes are as plentiful as blackberries (laughter) ; and the
English are fain to take a leaf out of our book, and to
borrow the Scotch system — that excellent system which
is one of the most beneficial features in our commercial
economy, and which has so largely contributed to raise
our nation to the high rank which it now holds.

Mr BURNESS, Banker, returned thanks.

The CHAIRMAN then gave " The Town and Trade
of Stonehaven, and Mr Barclay, the superior of the
Newtown."

Mr BARCLAY, in returning thanks, said the superior
of the Newtown was Lord Arbuthnott. There was one
man still alive, who recollected when there was but one
thatched house in Arduthie, or the Newtown of Stone-
haven. The plan of it had been laid down by his father,
and it was now the most regular little town in Scotland,
containing three thousand inhabitants. His father, though
not the superior, was truly the father of it. (Cheers.)

Several other toasts were drunk, and the evening
passed with the greatest harmony and cordiality. The
company broke up before ten o'clock.

The dinner was of the best description, and the arrange
ments reflected great credit upon the committee of ma*
nagement.

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THE ANNALS OF THE PARISH, AND AYRSHIRE

LEGATEES. BY GALT.
SIR ANDREW WYLIE. By GALT.
TOM CRINGLE'S LOG. By MICHAEL SCOTT.

To be immediately followed by

CYRIL THORNTON, REGINALD DALTON, VALE
RIUS, PEN OWEN, PERCY MALLORY, CRUISE
OF THE MIDGE, and Others.

THE PRINCIPLES OF POPULATION

AND THEIR

CONNEXION WITH HUMAN HAPPINESS.

By ARCHIBALD ALISON, ESQ. F. R, S. E., ADVOCATE,

Sheriff of Lanarkshire.
Author of " The History of Europe during the French Revolution."

*« Increase and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it."
" Thou shalt do justice and love mercy."

In Two Volumes, 8vo. Price 30s.

BLACKWOOD'S COUNTY ATLAS OF SCOTLAND ;

Consisting of Thirty-two Maps,includingthe Orkney, Shetland,
and Western Islands, with the Parochial Boundaries care
fully coloured, and a General Map of Scotland.
In one Volume, 4to, price 2 Is. handsomely bound in cloth.

SEPARATE MAPS OF THE COUNTIES,

neatly put uj
price Is. eacl

Coloured as above, and neatly put up in a Case for the Pocket,

;h.

STABLE ECONOMY.

A TREATISE ON THE MANAGEMENT OF HORSES, IN RELATION
TO STABLING, GROOMING, FEEDING, WATERING, AND
WORKING.

By JOHN STEWART,

Veterinary Surgeon, Professor of Veterinary Medicine in the

Andersonian University, Glasgow.

In foolscap, 8vo, price 7s. 6d.

BRITISH AMERICA.
By JOHN M'GREGOR, ESQ.

With Fifteen Maps, containing full and accurate Sketches of
the Climate, Soil, Natural Productions, Agriculture, Trade,
Fisheries, &c. of the Canadas, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick,
Prince Edward Island, Cape Breton, Newfoundland, &c. &c.
with full and practical information to Emigrants. The Se
cond Edition, with numerous Additions. In 2 large vols.
8vo, price L. 1, 10s.

This Edition contains much additional information ; and
the whole accounts have been brought down to the latest
period.

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