M MIDDLESEX SOCIETY. 



The land is good fruit land, and my intention has been to 

 make the raising of fruit for sale my chief business. 



The first winter I kept eight cows and a horse. They con- 

 sumed all the hay that I cut on the place. For the last two 

 or three winters I have kept on an average, equal to nineteen 

 or twenty cows, and sold but little hay. 



I have laid from 125 to 150 rods of stone wall, and grafted 

 nearly all my old apple trees with valuable fruit. I have set 

 out (three and four years ago) about 225 apple trees, 175 peach 

 trees, 48 pear trees, 25 Isabella grape vines, 25 to 30 cherry 

 trees, 15 apricot trees, and smaller fruits, such as strawberries, 

 currants, &c. 



I am now employed in digging drains in my wet grounds, 

 and filling them wdth the small stones from the surface of my 

 ploughed lands, preferring this way of getting rid of them, to 

 putting them into walls. I have dug and filled, or am filling, 

 about sixty-five or seventy rods this fall, some portion of them 

 five feet w^ide, others two or three. 



These things, with my limited means, have been the work 

 of time. I have not done as I would, but have been obliged 

 to do as I could. With a young family dependent upon me, 

 unable to e^n their living, but, thank God, almost always able 

 to eat their share ; with my interest money ($250 a year) to 

 make out, and my farm to improve, I have so far weathered 

 the storm, with a head wind, and am a little nearer the harbor 

 than I was when I commenced the voyage. I have paid up 

 about $600 on the mortgage, and laid out nearly $2,000 in 

 permanent improvements on my buildings and farm. I now 

 cut more than twice as many tons of English hay as I did 

 when I came on the farm. Many of the trees are beginning 

 to rejDay me for my labor upon them. 



In regard to the queries put me, I will answer in course. 



1. Of how many acres did your farm consi^ in 1848 ? 

 About eighty-five acres. 



2. What was the condition of the land at that time, m a 

 good state of cultivation, or otherwise ? 



I had been gradually bringing it into a better state than 

 when I bought in 1843, as my limited means \vould allow. 

 8. What proportion of it was in tillage, pasture, and w^ood? 

 I should think twenty-five acres in English mowing, of 



