366 INDIANA HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS 



will try to meet them manfully. So they must not be im- 

 patient at unavoidable delays. 

 Lake C. H. la. March 21, 1843. 



Western Farming. 



[Albany Cultivator, 10:81-82; May, 1843] 



[March 24, 1843] 

 To my friend of Richmond Co. N. Y. 1 — Your letter in 

 the March No. of the Cultivator, has been near three 

 weeks on hand. I would have made more haste to answer 

 it, but since it was written, you must have seen my article 

 in the February No., in which I have anticipated some 

 of your inquiries. 2 And I hope you have also seen the 

 American Agriculturist, published in New- York city, in 

 which you will find some more information upon the sub- 

 ject of farming in the west. 3 



I am now writing upon the 21st of March; a clear 

 sunny day, and the thermometer in the shade, 25° below 

 the freezing point; and the latitude 41° 30'. [By the by, 

 there is an error of 9° in the statement of your lati- 

 tude.*] The ground covered with snow, and I should 

 now be gliding over it after a load of pine timber near 

 the beach of the lake, only that I was taken slightly un- 

 well after I had got my horses harnessed for a start — 

 to that you owe my present occupation. This is a very 

 unusual hard winter, and the people are learning a les- 

 son of dear bought experience. For notwithstanding the 

 fact that hay of a most excellent quality, equal to timo- 



* This was a typographical error. It should have read "Lat. 

 40°, 30', N."— Eds. 



1 Richmond, pseudonym of Dr. Samuel Akerly, New York. Born 

 1785; died July 6, 1845. Contributor to, and reviewer of, the 

 Cultivator, 1841-1845. Also wrote under signature of "A Practi- 

 cal Farmer." Akerly, a retired physician formerly prominent in 

 New York City, attracted much attention with his writings, but 

 the editors concealed his identity until after his death. See obitu- 

 ary, Cultivator, n. s. 2:252 (August, 1845). 



2 Ante, 348-57. 

 'Ante, 343-47. 



