Along the whole road I am struck with the marks of an astonishing degree of improvement since I came this way four years ago. I do not think that any part of England is better cultivated, and at present the wheat is in a very promising state. I wish we may hear of that of England promising as well. Three years of such a scarcity is more than any country could bear, and you will believe me when I say that, if it was in my power, I would guard it not only from famine, but from every other calamity. With my daughter's kindest remembrance, I am, as ever Dear Sir Yours sincerely, J. PRIESTLEY.[8] Resuming his correspondence with his numerous friends in England, he said: My chief resource is my daily occupation. He also wrote Dr. Rush his thanks for having advised him to read Noah Webster's _Pestilential Disorders_ which follow the appearance of meteors and earthquakes, taking occasion also to excuse his opposition to blood-letting,-- I believe that I owe my life to your judicious direction of it. I shall never forget your so readily forgiving my suspicion, and my requesting the concurrence of Dr. Wistar after the third bleeding. It was his opinion as well as yours and Dr. Caldwell's, that my disorder required several more; and the completeness of my cure, and the speediness of my recovery, prove that you were right. In the future I shall never be afraid of the lancet when so judiciously directed. To Rush he confided his doubts about his paper on Dreams. He cannot account for them, hence he has offered merely an hypothesis, and continues-- I frequently think with much pleasure and regret on the many happy hours I spent in your company, and wish we were not at so great distance. Such society would be the value of life to me. But I must acquiesce in what a wise providence has appointed. His friends continued sending him books. And how joyously he received them. At times he would mention special works, as for example,-- Please to add Gate's Answer to Wall, and Wall's Reply; Sir John Pringle's Discourses and Life by Dr. Kippis; Chandler's Life of King David; Colin Milne's Botanical Dictionary, Botanic Dialogues, and other books of Natural History; Kirwan's Analysis of Mineral Waters; Crosby's History of English Baptists. In one of his letters he observed-- A person must be in my situation ... to judge of my feelings when I receive new books. Strangely enough a _box_ of books was sent him to Carlisle (Pa.) and had been there for two years before he learned of it.