As has been said before, Eliza's ambition was to follow out her father's plan, to discover some crop which could be raised successfully as a staple export, and the determination and perseverance with which she set out to accomplish the task, shows that she was made of no ordinary stuff, even at sixteen, when the majority of girls were occupied with far different activity and diversions. Indigo seems to have been the crop most likely to succeed, and to that Eliza turned her attention with the intensity of purpose which marked all her actions. It was no easy achievement to cultivate indigo, as it required very careful preparation of the soil, much attention during its growth, and a long and critical process to prepare it for the market. After a series of experiments, she reported to her father: I wrote you in a former letter we had a fine crop of Indigo seed upon the ground and since informed you the frost took it before it was dry. I picked out the best of it and had it planted but there is not more than a hundred bushes of it come up, w^{ch} proves the more unlucky, as you have sent a man to make it. I make no doubt Indigo will prove a very valueable commodity in time, if we could have the seed from the east Indies time enough to plant the latter end of March, that the seed might be dry enough to gather before our frost. I am sorry we lost this season we can do nothing towards it now but make the works ready for next year. The death of my Grandmamma was as you imagine very shocking and grevious to my Mama, but I hope the consideration of the miserys that attend so advanced an age will help time to wear it off. I am very much obliged to you for the present you were so good to send me of the fifty pound bill of Exchange w^{ch} I duely received. Mama tenders you her affections and polly joyns in duty with My dear Papa Your ob^t and ever Devoted Daughter, _E. Lucas_. In the following letters we find her showing a lively interest in all that concerns her father, her brothers, her "cousens" and neighbours, and also a normally healthy liking for amusement, linked with her passionate love of nature and a milder interest in pretty clothes--and a still milder form of interest in love affairs!