EAST OV THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 57 



and the pounds would take care of themselves. During his absence 

 from Mount Vernon, while serving as President of the United States, 

 residing at Kew York and Philadelphia, he exacted weekly reports from 

 Lis overseer and gave weekly directions as to the management of his 

 estate. He kept a sharp watch on the price of flour at Alexandria and 

 the amount of butter used in the family; cautioned his overseer not to 

 trust the neighbors for the services of his Spanish jackass, and thought 

 some of his slaves ate too much bacon, and that the servant in charge 

 of the butter either used too much of it or sold it at the tavern in Alex- 

 andria, when he made the weekly trip to that place to seU small prod- 

 uce and lay in suppUes such as sugar, salt, and nails. His frequent 

 references to his sheep are Interesting. On April 6, 1794, he writes to 

 Mr. Pearce, his overseer : 



I am sorry to find that my chance for lambs this year is so bad. It does not ap- 

 pear to me by the reports that I shall have more than a third of what I had last year. 

 What this can be ascribed to is beyond my comprehension, unless it be for ^¥ant of 

 rams. Let, therefore, at shearing time, a selection of the best be formed, and other- 

 wise promising ram lambs be set apart (in sufficient numbers) to breed from, and 

 when they are fit for it, cut the old ones and turn them aside to be disposed of. At 

 shearing time, also, let there be a thorough culling out of all the old and indifferent 

 sheep from the flocks, that they may be disposed of, and thereby save me the morti- 

 fication of hearing every week of their death, which is the more vexatious as 1 was 

 taught to believe that every indifferent sheep was drawn for this purpose last spring, 

 notwithstanding the loss of them which has been sustained the past winter, and, 

 indeed, unto the present moment. 



On June 8, 1794, he writes : 



So far has it been from my practice or policy to sell off the forward ewe lambs, 

 that, in order to prevent it, I would not suffer any lambs to be disposed of at all un- 

 less it was the very later runts. My plan, while it was in my power to attend to 

 these matters myself, was to be sparing of the lambs, even for my own table, and 

 never to kill the females; to keep the ewe lambs (especially the later ones) from 

 the rams the first year; to separate the rams from the ewes at sh(e)aring time (to be 

 returned at a proper season), and, at sh(e)aring time also, to cull over and remove to 

 a pasture by themselves all the sheep above a certain age, and all such as appeared 

 to be upon the decline, that, after receiving the summer's run, and such aid as could 

 otherwise be afforded them, they might be disposed of to the butchers, reserving 

 enough for the use of the family. 



The flock seems to have deteriorated, and Washington writes, May 

 15,1796: 



I do not now know where to advise you to get supplied with good rams. « » * 

 But this ought not to deter you from the purchase of (at least) one good ram, to go 

 to a score or more of your choicest ewes — from such an experiment and beginning 

 you might, by the year following, have rams enough for the whole flock. This 

 method I pursued some years ago to the very great advancement of my breed of 

 sheep. 



On Washington's return to private life in 1797, he found that his 

 sheep, numbering 800 in 1788, and producing 5^ pounds of wool, had 

 dwindled down to not more than 200, producing about 2^ pounds of 

 wool each. While as a rule the mutton of Virginia was deemed excel- 

 lent, that raised by Washington exceeded all other in its sweetness 

 and delicacy, and was universally extolled by those who had the pleas- 



