PREFACE. 



A VARIETY of motives, which it may be proper briefly to state, have induced me 

 to submit the following Letters to the attention of the public. 



It could not but be highly gratifying to me, to be possessed of so many interesting 

 communications from such a distinguished character as the President of the United 

 States; and it was natural to suppose, that the public at large, but more especially 

 those individuals who revered his memory, would wish to have in their possession 

 copies of a correspondence which displayed to such advantage the superior talents, 

 the generous views, and the unbounded philanthropy of that celebrated statesman. 



The peculiar predilection which General WASHINGTON has so strongly and so 

 frequently expressed, in the subsequent letters, for agricultural improvement, which 

 he preferred to every other pursuit, is another circumstance which I was anxious 

 should be recorded for the benefit both of the present and of future times, from a 

 desire that it may make a due impression upon the minds of those who might 

 otherwise be induced to dedicate themselves entirely, either to the phantoms of 

 military fame, or the tortures of political ambition. 



The praises which this distinguished statesman has bestowed on the establishment 



