The society is near Alfred, in York County, about thirty miles southwesterly from Portland. Its estate of eleven hundred acres lies in a pretty situation, between hills, and includes a large pond and an important water-power. The land is not very fertile or easily cultivated. They sold off last year an outlying tract of timber-land for $28,000, and were glad to be rid of it. The society consists now of two families, having between sixty-five and seventy members, of whom two fifths are men and the remainder women. They are all Americans but two, of whom one is Irish and one Welsh. The society was "gathered" in 1794; there were then three families; and in 1823 it had two hundred members. Twelve years ago one of the families, being small, was drawn in to the others, and the buildings it occupied have since been let out. The decrease began to be rapid about thirty years ago, when the founders, who had become very aged, died off, and new members did not come in in sufficient numbers to take their places. Two thirds of the present members were brought into the society as children, many being brought by their parents: others, orphans, adopted. Twenty per cent, of the present membership are over fifty years of age. The two families now raise a few garden seeds, make brooms, hair sieves, dry measures, keep a tan-yard, and make besides most of their home supplies. They also farm their own land. They have leased to outside people a saw-mill and grist-mill which they own. The young women make small baskets, fans, and other fancy articles, which are sold during the summer at neighboring sea-side watering-places. They hire a few outside laborers. About a quarter of the people eat no meat. They have improved their sanitary regulations in the last twenty years, and have almost extirpated fevers. Formerly cancer was a frequent disease among them, but since they ceased to eat pork this has disappeared. They take nine or ten newspapers, and encourage reading; have a small library, and a good school, in which thirteen children are taught. The people have been long-lived; only a few weeks before I visited Alfred, died at the Church Family Lucy Langdon Nowell, aged ninety-eight. She was born on the 4th of July, 1776, and had lived almost all her life in the society, her father having been one of its founders, and the owner of some of the land on which the society now live. Had she lived long enough, she was to have been taken to the proposed Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia. In the last ten years this society has maintained its numbers, but has not gained. They do not receive many applications for membership; and of those who apply, not more than one in ten "makes a good Shaker."