The Agricultural Papers of George Washington 117 



In the years 1802, 1803, and so on 



The corn ground remaining the same, two fields, in the 

 following numbers, will be fallowed for wheat, and treated in 

 all respects as mentioned above; and if pumpkins, cymlins, 

 turnips, pease, and such like growth, are found beneficial to 

 the land, or useful and profitable to the stock, ground may 

 readily be found for them. 



These are the great outlines of a plan, and the operations 

 of it, for the next year, and for years to come, for the River 

 Farm. To carry it into effect advantageously, it becomes 

 the indispensable duty of him, who is employed to overlook and 

 conduct the operations, to take a prospective and comprehen 

 sive view of the whole business, which is laid before him, that 

 the several parts thereof may be so ordered and arranged, 

 as that one sort of work may follow another sort in proper 

 succession, and without loss of labor or of time ; for nothing 

 is a greater waste of the latter, and consequently of the 

 former (time producing labor, and labor money), than shift 

 ing from one thing to another before it is finished, as if chance 

 or the impulse of the moment, not judgment and foresight, 

 directed the measure. It will be acknowledged, that weather 

 and other circumstances may at times interrupt a regular 

 course of proceedings ; but, if a plan is well digested before 

 hand, they cannot interfere long, with a man who is ac 

 quainted with the nature of the business, and the crops he 

 is to attend to. 



Every attentive and discerning person, who has the whole 

 business of the year laid before him, and is acquainted with 

 the nature of the work, can be at no loss to lay it out to 

 advantage. There are many sorts of in^doors work, which 

 can be executed in hail, rain, or snow, as well as in sunshine; 

 and if they are set about in fair weather (unless there be a 



