[ xii ] 



of this part of the enquiry will clearly 

 appear. 



In refpect to Jiile and accuracy of language, 

 the candid reader will, I hope, confider the 

 time, places, and manner of writing thefe 

 fheets;. the minutes were fo extremely 

 numerous, and of fuch variety, that, had 

 they not been regiftered as faft as they were 

 taken, it would have occafioned an endlefs 



confufion, and a work that is partly 



founded on the prefent ftate of affairs {viz. 

 the prices of provifions, &c.) will not al- 

 low its author that time for correction and 

 polilhing, which more favourable fubjects 

 afford : This plea will perhaps be the rea- 

 dier accepted, when it is confidered, that I 

 pretend to nothing but giving a book of 

 fads. 



Indeed the undertaking has been of that 

 laborious nature, that the idea of uniting 

 elegance with utility would be extrava- 

 gant : For many hundred miles, I had no- 

 thing but provincial weights and meafures, 

 totally unknown in the fouth : Thefe were 



all reduced to the common Itandard ; 



the intelligence I received in the mod com- 

 mon points was conceived in fuch uncom- 

 mon terms, and in fuch barbarous meafures, 

 that had 1 not gained numerous explana- 

 tions, my work would have been a volume 

 of contradictions. A practical know- 

 ledge of agriculture, is as tequiiite to fuch 



an 



