-50- 

 JEFFERSON TO JOHN PAGE, FROM PARIS, MAY 4, 1786 



Jefferson traveled widely, and wherever he went, he had a keen interest 



in farming conditions and methods. The following letter records 



certain of his observations on English agriculture 



I returned but three or four days ago from a two months' trip to 

 England. I traversed that country much, and own both town and country 

 fell short of my expectations, Comparing it with this, I found a much 

 greater proportion of barrens, a soil, in other parts, not naturally 

 so good as this, not better cultivated, but better manured, and, there- 

 fore, more productive. This proceeds from the practice of long leases 

 there, and short ones here. The laboring people here are poorer than 

 in England. They pay about one half their produce in rent; the Eng- 

 lish, in general, about a third. The gardening, in that country, is 

 the article in which it surpasses all the earth. I mean their pleasure 

 gardening. This, indeed, went far beyond my ideas. The city of Lon- 

 don, though handsomer than Paris, is not so handsome as Philadelphia. 

 Their architecture is in the most wretched style I ever saw, not 

 meaning to except America, where it is bad, nor even Virginia, where 

 it is worse than in any other part of America v/hich I have seen.... 

 In the arts, the most striking thing I saw there, new, was the ap- 

 plication of the principle of the steam-engine to grist mills. I saw 

 eight pair of stones which are worked by steam, and there are to be 

 set up thirty pair in the same house. A hundred bushels of coal a 

 day, are consumed at present. I do not know in what proportion the 

 consumption will be increased by the additional geer. ... - H. A. Wash- 

 ington, ed., The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, 1:548-551 (Washington, D. C, 

 Taylor & Maury, 1853). 



