Whether North or South the praise of woman's industry in those days is much the same. John Lawson who made a survey journey through North Carolina in 1760, wrote in his _History of North Carolina_ that the women were the more industrious sex in this section, and made a great deal of cloth of their own cotton, wool, and flax. In spite of the fact that their families were exceedingly large, he noted that all went "very decently appareled both with linens and woolens," and that because of the labor of the wives there was no occasion to run into the merchant's debt or lay out money on stores of clothing. And hundreds of miles north old Judge Sewall had expressed in his _Diary_ his utmost confidence in his wife's financial ability when he wrote: "1703-4 ... Took 24s in my pocket, and gave my Wife the rest of my cash £4, 3-8 and tell her she shall now keep the Cash; if I want I will borrow of her. She has a better faculty than I at managing Affairs: I will assist her; and will endeavour to live upon my salary; will see what it will doe. The Lord give his blessing."[105] And nearly seventy years later John Adams, in writing to Benjamin Rush, declares a similar confidence in his help-meet and expresses in his quiet way genuine pride in her willingness to meet all ordeals with him. "May 1770. When I went home to my family in May, 1770 from the Town Meeting in Boston ... I said to my wife, 'I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and to the ruin of our children. I give you this warning that you may prepare your mind for your fate.' She burst into tears, but instantly cried in a transport of magnanimity, 'Well, I am willing in this cause to run all risks with you, and be ruined with you, if you are ruined.' These were times, my friend, in Boston which tried women's souls as well as men's."