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they have a garden of four or five acres, devoted to the raising of 

 garden seeds and medicinal herbs, under skilful and successful cultiva- 

 tion. Their annual sales have sometimes amounted to $3,100 ; and 

 they allow to their agents twenty-five per cent, commission on 

 sales, and take back what is unsold. They produce some wheat, 

 corn, and oats ; and they are now effecting with great labor and ad- 

 mirable skill the redemption of extensive alluvial meadows on Hop- 

 brook, by draining, rooting out the stumps, and cultivating the soil, 

 which will bring these lands under a course of most productive im- 

 provement. 



Of the religion of this peculiar people, it is not for me in this 

 place to speak. A religion which holds the severest restraint 

 over appetites and passions ever liable by their excesses to lead men 

 astray, which encourages industry, frugality, mutual love and kind- 

 ness, and that which is certainly not lowest in the scale of virtues, 

 the most exemplary neatness and order in every thing, is so far en- 

 tilled to respect and commendation. Under whatever aspect we view 

 it, we have at least occasion to congratulate ourselves, that we live 

 under a government tolerant to every honest difference of worship 

 and opinion ; and to remember, that the same principle, which se- 

 cures freedom to ourselves, should guarantee to others a like 

 boon. 



2. The establishment of the brethren at Pittsfield and Hancock, 

 consists of about seven hundred acres, lying together ; and is pos- 

 sessed by three large families, containing upwards of three hundred 

 individuals. They are united for all the general purposes of their 

 society ; but in their financial concerns are as families separate from 

 each other. The land is not of the best description, being low, cold 

 and wet ; and their attention is mainly directed to the cultivation of 

 grass and garden seeds, and the keeping of cows and sheep. Their 

 first purpose is for their own supply. They raise the best they can, 

 and they eat the best they raise ; and though from their temperate 

 and careful hal)its their thrift is remarkable, } et the accumulati n of 

 property is evidently not a principal object with them. They have 

 various mechanical contrivances by which their labor is nbridged or 

 lightened. They have made the best use of the water power which 

 tlieir place furnishes, and husband it with care and economy. They 

 have an extensive savv-miil carried by water, and all their fuel is cut 



