I paid Dunn a visit at his stables and looked at all his horses and colts, and I assure you that I was much pleased and gratified at their appearance. The horse Citizen is in fine order and condition; he is really a beautiful animal. The two three-year old fillies are also in fine condition. I think the one by Stockholder much the finest of the two, but the other is also a fine animal. His colts too (three in number) are in good order and very playful. Indeed, all of his horses are quite fat, as much so as there is any use for. One of your mares, the overseer informed me, was in Williamson (County) and as he would have soon to send for her he wishes me to say to you that he would want some money—$40 I think he said—to pay for her season and keeping. Upon the whole, if Mr. Holtzclaw will hold out as he has begun I think he will make you a good crop, if he has a good stand of cotton and the season suits, and take very good care of your stock. He feels, however, considerable uneasiness with regard to his cotton crop—he is afraid his stand will not be a good one. His seed, he says, were not good, nor could he get those that were good anywhere. He finished planting yesterday, the 20th of April, while I was at the Hermitage. He says he could have planted a week earlier, but not having confidence in the soundness of his seed he did not like to risk them sooner. He will finish planting his corn tomorrow. He tells me he has 200 acres in cotton, considerably upwards of 300 acres in corn, and something like 120 or 130 acres in oats. He has his sweet potatoes planted, and in the piece of fresh land on the left hand of the gate as you approach the house. I enquired of him particularly about your meadows and timothy. He says no hay, he is afraid, can be made off them. Indeed, he says one piece (adjoining the lot Dunn’s stables are in) was so taken with weeds that he found it necessary to plow it up and put it in corn. He thinks that by tending it well this summer the weeds may be killed; and then, by sowing it down again in timothy, it might bring good grass. I looked at the ground, and by its appearance I have no doubt he done right in ploughing it up—it must have been very much taken by weeds. He has not ploughed up the other, but he is afraid it will not make hay. He say it was badly rooted up by the pigs and hogs last fall, and has now more weeds than grass in it. Your two fields of clover look very well, and a good deal of hay can be made off one of them (the one opposite the cotton gin) as Mr. Holtzclaw intends mowing it. The other, he says, he is obliged to pasture.