I have imagined and executed a mould-board which may be mathematically demonstrated to be perfect, as far as perfection depends on mathematical principles ... it is on the principle of two wedges combined at right angles, the first in the direct line of the furrow to raise the turf gradually, the...

I am become more firmly fixt to the glebe. if you visit me as a farmer, it must be as a condisciple: for I am but a learner; an eager one indeed but yet desperate, being too old now to learn a new art. however I am as much delighted & occupied with it as if I was the greatest adept.

I now employ a dozen little boys from 10. to 16. years of age, overlooking all the details of their business myself and drawing from it a profit on which I can get along till I can put my farms into a course of yeilding profit. my new trade of nail-making is to me in this country what an...

but I think I have observed that your countrymen who have been obliged to work out their own fortunes here, have succeeded best with a small farm. labour indeed is dear here, but rents are low, and on the whole a reasonable profit & comfortable subsistance results. it is at the same time the...

I, like other people, am so much the dupe of the fondness for the natale solum as to believe seriously there is no quarter of the globe so desireable as America, no state in america so desireable as Virginia, no county in Virginia equal to Albemarle & no spot in Albemarle to compare to...

a nailery which I have established with my own negro boys now provides completely for the maintenance of my family, as we make from 8. to 10,000 nails a day

I am become the most industrious & ardent farmer of the canton and have so much to do to recover my farms from the desolated state in which I found them after a ten years absence, that I have no fear of ennui.

I am entirely a farmer, soul and body, never scarcely admitting a sentiment on any other subject

our citizens are divided into two political sects. one which fears the people most, the other the government. you will readily judge in which of these the people themselves are. for my part I have no fear of a people, well-informed, easy in their circumstances, dispersed over their farms, &...

this I hope will be the age of experiments in government, and that their basis will be founded on principles of honesty, not mere force.

besides the attention to my farms I am uncovering & repairing my house, which during my absence had gone much to decay. I make some alterations in it with a greater eye to convenience than I had when younger.

I have one of the Scotch threshing machines nearly finished. it is copied exactly from a model mr Pinckney sent me, only that I have put the whole works (except the horse wheel) into a single frame moveable from one field to another on the two axles of a waggon.