FLOWER POTS AND THEIR MANUFACTURE. 15 



No one knows better than myself that pages of dates and 

 figures make very dr}' reading, and I will endeavor not to weary 

 you with them. Yet if I could, at this time, tell you the year 

 when our firm began to make flower pots, to whom they were sold, 

 and at what prices, it might iii^rest us all. Unfortunately there 

 is a long break in our records. 



Our oldest account book which I bring with me today as 

 evidence, shows that the first entry reads as follows: "Weston, 

 April 19, 1775, Lemuel Jones, to Ware, debtor: 0£ 2s 8d ;" and 

 on the same day, another: "Isaac Flagg, to Ware, Dr., 0£ 2s 

 7d." The next charges were made on the 29th of that month, 

 and there were three of them. In May of the same year there 

 were eight more. No further sales were recorded until February 

 20 ; whether of 1776 or the year following, the book fails to tell. 



From this time to 1788 the record is again broken. But from 

 1788 to 1810, a period of twenty-tAvo years, we have a continuous 

 account. The charges during that entire term cover about as 

 many pages as we now often use in one day ; and the amount in 

 dollars and cents does not compare with single sales of the year 

 1894. 



I have taken time to reckon up the sales of three years. The 

 charges were made, for the most part, in English money, — 

 pounds, shillings, and pence. But I find that in June of 1801 

 the form of entry was changed temporarily to the then new 

 American method of computing values in dollars and cents. This 

 evidently perplexed the accountant, who after two entries went 

 back to the familiar English money. In June of the next year 

 they made a second attempt to keep the books by the American " 

 system of reckoning, and were again, it would seem, speedily 

 discouraged. 



It is a somewhat interesting and remarkable fact that a third 

 attempt was made in June of 1803. The books became American 

 once more, but even then for a short time only. After this third 

 experiment,' they became apparently disgusted with the simple 

 scale of tens by which America had decided to regulate her 

 monetary system. Doubtless they returned gladly to the more 

 involved and complex calculations which familiarity had endeared 

 to them. But at last in 1807, again in June, the fourth attempt 

 was made — this time successfully. After that there was na 

 return to the old English currency. 



