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Observations on Colonel Taylor^ s Letter, by R, Peters, 



Belmont March ISth, 1809. 



Dear Sir, 



I return you Colonel Taylor's letter, which I have 

 read with the same pleasure all his communications in- 

 spire. His letters cannot be too long ; I wish those of 

 equal ability to give information (if many such there be, 

 among those devoted to agricultural occupations) would 

 take half the pains, either to establish facts or to commu- 

 nicate them. His mode of substituting the clothing of 

 its own surface, in place of artificial, or factitious ma- 

 nures, is new to us, on the scale he exhibits. The dif- 

 ference of the vegetation, ploughed in dry or succulent, 

 has always, with me, been in favour of the latter gready. 

 But w^hen I compare my relatively small husbandry, 

 with his expansive performances, over so vast a surface, 

 I feel like a dwarf along side of a giant : conscious of 

 some powers, according to weight and inches, — but 

 lost in comparative inferiority. Yet, after all, the prin- 

 ciples of small or large husbandry, though they may dif- 

 fer as to the extent of application, are the same. And 

 my opinions, suited to my capabilities, have always been 

 in favour of the " exiguum colito,'^^ I think there is more 

 gained by it, in proportion. If I can get as I have done, 

 from 30 to 50 bushels of wheat oft* a few acres — sup- 

 pose 20 — I gain more than the southern farmers do oft' 

 100 ; both in product, and saving expence. But they 

 have slaves individually fed and cloathed cheaply, and 

 paid no wages. The drones, — the old — the young — the 



