"The distress occasioned by the sudden reduction of our circulating medium from 100,000,000 dollars, to 45,000,000 dollars, has reduced all property far below its intrinsic value; the banks are prosecuting to recover sums loaned, mortgages are foreclosed, and landholders in debt are compelled to sell. When an European purchases land in the western countries, he has to clear and fence, and to build house and barn and stable, at a great expense. In the old states, as they are termed, the land is sold at so much per acre, and the house, barn, &c. are thrown into the bargain. Land, from four to eight miles from this city, may be averaged at twenty dollars an acre, ready to {465} be occupied. Navigation is near; the market is near; the newspapers, as essential almost to an Englishman as his breakfast, may be received three times a-week by market-carts. Society is good; the expense of a long journey, and a thousand inconveniences experienced by new settlers, are avoided. Horses and oxen, I believe, can be bought cheaper in this neighbourhood. If a man wants to remove his family and to sell, he can find purchasers more readily than in the western wilds. Sickness almost always occurs on the first exposure of new land to the sun. State taxes and county levies fall heavily on settlers in a new country, requiring public buildings, roads, bridges, &c.; labour is dear, and not always attainable. A New England man succeeds in a new country, because he is a jack-of-all-trades; he can make his own log-house, mend his cart, &c. There is an old adage, that "fools build, and wise men purchase." Suppose 150 acres, purchased in this neighbourhood, at twenty dollars an acre, making 3,000 dollars, the fencing, and building, and clearing, would cost at least that sum. When three or four Englishmen wish to purchase together, they ought to keep it a secret, and to employ some American, not in high life, who can be confided in, to sound persons wanting to sell; for if a stranger offers to buy, it is immediately reported over all the neighbourhood, and prices are raised, and it exaggerates the value. Americans are remarkably shrewd. {466} Englishmen, in general, are credulous and sanguine. All bargains ought to be legally formal, under signature and seal. "Question. Is great Britain capable of sustaining its national debt for any length of time? "There are operating against the possibility of this, _1st._--The rivalship of manufactures of other nations, knowledge and skill not being an exclusive advantage. _2nd._--The encrease of poor-rates, by a superabundant population, and reduction of wages. _3rd._--The augmentation of payments abroad to British residents, who avoid taxation by removing to foreign countries.