nished with duplicates) the plan, in all its parts, which is hereafter detailed; to hear their ideas with respect to the order in which the different sorts of work therein pointed out shall succeed each other, for the purpose of carrying it on to the best advantage; to correct any erroneous projects they may be disposed to adopt; and then to see, that they adhere strictly to whatever may be resolved on, and that they are always (except when otherwise permitted) on their farms, and with their people. The work, under such circumstances, will go on smoothly; and, that the stock may be well fed, littered, and taken care of according to the directions, it will be necessary to inspect the conduct of the overseers in this particular, and those also whose immediate business it is to attend upon them, with a watchful eye; otherwise, and generally in severe weather, when attention and care are most needed, they will be most neglected.

Economy in all things is as commendable in the manager, as it is beneficial and desirable to the employer; and, on a farm, it shows itself in nothing more evidently, or more essentially, than in not suffering the provender to be wasted, but, on the contrary, in taking care that every atom of it be used to the best advantage; and, likewise, in not permitting the ploughs, harness, and other implements of husbandry, and the gears belonging to them, to be unnecessarily exposed, trodden under foot, run over by carts, and abused in other respects. More good is derived from attending to the minutia of a farm, than strikes people at first view; and examining the farm-yard fences, and looking into the fields to see that nothing is there but what is allowed to be there, is oftentimes the means of producing more good, or at least of avoiding more evil, than can be accomplished by riding from one working party or overseer to another. I have mentioned these things not only because they have occurred to me, but because, although apparently trifles, they prove far otherwise in the result.

The account for the present quarter must be made final, as an entire new scene will take place afterwards. In doing this, advertise in the Alexandria paper for the claims of every kind and nature whatsoever against me, to be brought to you by the 1st of January, that I may wipe them off, and begin on a fresh score. All balances in my favor must either be received, or reduced to specialties, that there may be no disputes hereafter.

I am, Sir, &c.

RIVER FARM.

DIRECTIONS CONCERNING CROPS FOR THE RIVER FARM, AND OPERATIONS THEREON, FOR THE YEAR 1800.*

FIELD NO. 1,-Is now partly in wheat; part is to be sown with oats; another part may be sown with pease, broad cast; part is in meadow, and will remain so; the most broken, washed, and indifferent part is to remain uncultivated, but to be harrowed and smoothed in the spring, and the worst portions, if practicable, to be covered with litter, straw, weeds, or any kind of vegetable rubbish, to prevent them from running into gullies.

No. 2.-One fourth is to be in corn, and to be sown with wheat; another fourth in buckwheat and pease, half of it in the one, and half in the other, sown in April, to be ploughed in as a green dressing, and by actual experiment to ascertain which is best. The whole of this fourth is to be sown with wheat also; another fourth part is to be naked fallow for wheat; and the other and last quarter to be appropriated for pumpkins, cymlins, turnips, Yateman pease, in hills, and such other things of this kind as may be required; and to be sown likewise with rye, after they are taken off, for seed.

No. 3, Is now in wheat, to be harvested in the year 1800; the stubble of which, immediately after harvest, is to be ploughed in and sown thin with rye; and such parts thereof as are low, or produce a luxuriant growth of grain, are to have grass-seeds sprinkled over them. The whole for sheep to run on in the day (but housed at night) during the winter and spring months. If it should be found expedient, part thereof in the spring might be reserved for the purpose of seed.

No. 4, Will be in corn, and is to be sown in the autumn of that year with wheat, to be harvested in 1801; and to be treated in all respects as has been directed for No. 3, the preceding year. It is to be manured as much as the means will permit, with such aids as can be procured during the present winter and ensuing spring.

* The "plan alluded to in the preceding letter contained directions for the management and cultivation of three farms, and extended to thirty closely written folio pages. The parts relating to two farms only are here printed. These minute and detailed instructions are the more singular, as Washington expected to reside at home, and exercise a superintendence himself over the whole.

VOL. XII.

46

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Nos. 5, 6, 7, and 8,- Are to remain as they are, but nothing suffered to run upon them; as ground will be allotted for the sole purpose of pasturage, and invariably used as such.

Clover Lots.

No. 1,― Counting from the Spring Branch is to be planted in potatoes.

No. 2,―That part thereof which is now in turnips is to be sown with oats and clover; the other part, being now in clover, is to remain so until it comes into potatoes by rotation.

No. 3, Is also in clover at present, and is to remain so, just mentioned, for No. 2.

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as

No. 4, Is partly in clover and partly in timothy, and so to be, until its turn for potatoes.

The rotation for these lots invariably is to be, 1. Potatoes, highly manured; 2. Oats, and clover sown therewith; 3. Clover; 4. Clover. Then to begin again with potatoes, and proceed as before. The present clover lots must be plastered.

All green sward, rough ground, or that which is heavily covered with weeds, bottle-brush grass, and such things as being turned in will ferment, putrefy, and meliorate the soil, should in autumn be ploughed in, and at such times in winter as it can be done while the ground is dry, and in condition for it.

Pasture Grounds.

The large lot adjoining the negro houses and orchard is to have oats sown on the potato and pumpkin ground; with which, and on the rye also in that lot, and on the melon part, orchard grass-seeds are to be sown; and thereafter to be kept as a standing calf pasture, and for ewes (which may require extra care) at yeaning, or after they have yeaned.

The other large lot, northeast of the barn lane, is to be appropriated always as a pasture for the milch cows, and probably working oxen during the summer season.

The woodland, and the old field commonly called Johnston's, are designed for common pasture, and to be so applied always. To which, if it should be found inadequate to the stock of the farm, field No. 8, and the woodland therein, may be added.

Meadows.

Those already established and in train must continue, and the next to be added to them is the arms of the creek, which runs

up to the spring-house, and forks, both prongs of which must be grubbed up, and wrought upon at every convenient moment when the weather will permit, down to the line of the ditch, which encloses the lots for clover, &c.

And, as the fields come into cultivation, or as labor can be spared from other work, and circumstances will permit, the heads of all the inlets in them must be reclaimed, and laid to grass, whether they be large or small. Forasmuch as nothing will run on, or can trespass upon, or injure the grass, no fencing is required.

Mud for Compost.

The season is now too far advanced, and too cold, to be engaged in a work, that will expose the hands to wet; but it is of such essential importance, that it should be set about seriously and with spirit next year, for the summer's sun and the winter's frost to prepare it for the corn and other crops of 1801. All the hands of the farm, not indispensably engaged in the crops, should, so soon as corn-planting is completed in the spring, be uninterruptedly employed in raising mud from the pocosons, and from the bed of the creek, into the scow; and the carts, so soon as the manure for the corn and potatoes in 1800 is carried out, are to be incessantly drawing it to the compost heaps in the fields, which are to be manured by it. What number of hands can be set apart for this all-important work, remains to be considered and decided upon.

Penning Cattle and Folding Sheep

On the fields intended for wheat, from the first of May, when the former should be turned out to pasture, until the first of November, when they ought to be housed, must be practised invariably; and to do it with regularity and propriety, the pen for the former, and the fold for the latter, should be proportioned to the number of each kind of stock; and both these to as much ground as they will manure sufficiently in the space of a week for wheat, beyond which they are not to remain in a place, except on the poorest spots; and even these had better be aided by litter or something else, than to depart from an established rule, of removing the pens on a certain day in each week. For in this, as in every thing else, system is essential to carry on business well, and with ease.

* Pocoson is a word used in Virginia to denote a small swamp or marshy place.

Feeding.

The work-horses and mules are always to be in their stalls, and all littered and cleaned, when they are out of harness; and they are to be plenteously fed with cut straw, and as much chopped grain, meal, or bran, with a little salt mixed therewith, as will keep them always in good condition for work; seeing also, that they are watered as regularly as they are fed; this is their winter feed. For spring, summer, and autumn, it is expected, that soiling them on green food, first with rye, then with lucerne, and next with clover, with very little grain, will enable them to perform their work.

The oxen, and other horned cattle, are to be housed from the first of November until the first of May; and to be fed as well as the means on the farm will admit. The first (oxen) must always be kept in good condition, housed in the stalls designed for them; and the cows (so many of them as can find places), on the opposite side. The rest, with the other cattle, must be in the newly-erected sheds; and the whole carefully watered every day; the ice, in frozen weather, being broken, so as to admit them to clean water.

With respect to the sheep, they must receive the best protection that can be given them this winter; against the next, I hope they will be better provided for.

And with regard to the hogs, the plan must be, to raise a given number of good ones, instead of an indiscriminate number of indifferent ones, half of which die or are stolen before the period arrives for putting them up as porkers. To accomplish this, a sufficient number of the best sows should be appropriated to the purpose; and so many pigs raised from them as will insure the quantity of pork, which the farm ought to furnish.

Whether it will be most advisable to restrain these hogs from running at large or not, can be decided with more precision after the result of those now in close pens is better known.

The exact quantity of corn used by those, which are now in pens, should be ascertained and regularly reported, in order to learn the result.

Stables and Farm Pens.

These ought to be kept well littered, and the stalls clean; as well for the comfort of the creatures that are contained in them, as for the purpose of manure; but, as straw cannot be afforded for this purpose, leaves and such spoiled straw or weeds as will