_5th. How long in the year can labour be procured?_--About six months. _6th. Are wages paid regularly?_--Very rarely. Mostly defrauded. _7th. Then who are the persons that can do?_--A man with a family of hard-working children, possessing 300_l._ sterling, and who should reside twelve months in the States before he purchases land. And it is greatly to be feared that both the emigrant and his family must lay in all the low cunning, and [l]earn to defraud and cheat, as practised {443} here, and entirely forget old English principles and society, or else ruin and misery will be his portion. _8th. Mechanics._--Any part of the world before the United States, for, whatever they may earn, they will be sure to be defrauded out of half. _9th. Wages._--Not so much as in England, taking the year through. _July 6th._--Visited the house of the President, a good, substantial, pleasant abode, but neither so elegant, superb, nor costly as the seats of our nobility. I saw nothing about it remarkable; no pictures, save Washington's; no curiosities, no painted ceilings. The walls are covered with French paper, and the rooms are furnished with French furniture. Its front looks over the Potowmac and Alexandria, down to Mount Vernon, through a vast extent of Southern Virginian scenery. A favourite English butler shewed us all, and regaled us with good biscuit, brandy, and sherry. _7th._--This morning the Hon. Thomas Law, accompanied by Mr. Elliott, made me a call in return for mine. He very politely regretted his absence when I called, and invited me to come and spend a day or two with him at his farm, for the purpose of concluding the conversation now commenced in the following words. _Mr. Law._--"You, Mr. F., saw my farm and garden. They are poor, but I will improve the gravelly hills by carting earth on to them from the {444} valleys. The English labourers sent to me by Mr. Curwen, I have dismissed. They could do nothing but plough; they were stupid, conceited, uncivil, and latterly drunken; whiskey, and the company they met, seduced them. When I began farming I knew not wheat from rye, or rye from barley; but I well know what are the benefits of farming." "You, Sir, pursue it only for your pleasure?" "No, Sir, I want profit." "In the present distressed state of agriculture little profit is to be had." "Truly so; but a paper circulation is wanted. Mr. Crawford fully agreed with me on this point, but disingenuously seceded from it in his report, on which account I have addressed several pointed letters to him, which I will send you as well as my address to the agricultural society of Prince George's county."