156 FACTS RELATING TO GROTON, MASSACHUSETTS. 



opened my school with about twenty schollars. The number has 

 been increasing since so that now I have about fifty. With respect 

 to my boarding place I have such an one as I could wish. I live 

 vi'ith one of the first farmers in the County of Middlesex. Maj. 

 Moors, the gentleman's name, keeps about forty head of cattle 

 besides sheep, horses, turkeys, hogs, &c. &c. He sometimes raises 

 seven or eight hundred bushels of rye nearly as much corn and 

 between ten and fifteen thousand weight of hops. His hops this last 

 season brought him in upwards of one thousand dollars but they cost 

 him more labor to prepare them for the market than to get his hay. Last 

 year they were cut off together with large fields of rye, and apples in 

 all probability sufficient for one hundred & fifty beryls of cyder, by 

 a most remarkable hail storm near the first of June. The hail stones 

 were many of them as large as partridge eggs and fell in such quan- 

 tities and with such violence as to break all the glass in the side of 

 buildings facing the wind, and to cover the floors of houses with soot 

 and black hail stones. The storm happened on Monday when it was 

 very warm ; and altho' it lasted but an hour and an half the hail stones 

 were knee deep in a certain tray fashion places near here on the Fri- 

 day following. Parson Write of Boulton [Bolton], preaching here the 

 succeeding Sunday, picked up hail stones in the road and carried 

 home for a show. Orchards were so stripped and bruised that they 

 have borne but little since ; and large dints in buildings about here 

 still remain as monuments of this tremendous storm. 



I live, Sir, with a very hospitable and benevolent people. My 

 accomodations are very good. I live about one quarter of a mile 

 from school & about two miles from meeting. 



We have today, Sir, experienced a very pleasant and agreeable 

 commencement of a new year. While it reminds of the benevolence 

 and the continued mercy of Providence, ought it not lead us to 

 reflect on the quick succession of years, on the shortness and the 

 value of life, to consider and to correct the errors of the past year, 

 and to fortify our minds with such principles of virtue and piety, as 

 shall preserve us in the pleasant and peaceful paths of wisdom. You, 

 Sir, and the rest of the family, whether at home or absent I most 

 cordially wish a happy new year, and many yet to come. I acknowl- 

 edge the debt of gratitude. I feel a tender attachment to the family. 

 Every new scene of life leads me to value more and more highly those 

 habits and principles imbibed in early youth, for which I am indebted 

 to kind and obliging Parents. I wish, Sir, to hear from home, 

 particularly of the accident which James lately met with, of his 



