speak a compound of the three, & neither perfectly. The journey which I propose to you need not be expensive, and would be very useful. With your talents & industry, with science, and that steadfast honesty which eternally pursues right, regardless of consequences, you may promise yourself everything -but health, without which there is no happiness. An attention to health then should take place of every other object. The time necessary to secure this by active exercises, should be devoted to it in preference to every other pursuit. I know the difficulty with which a studious man tears himself from his studies at any given moment of the day. But his happiness & that of his family depend on it. The most uninformed mind with a healthy body, is happier than the wisest valetudinarian. I need not tell you that if I can be useful to you in any part of this or any other plan you shall adopt, you will make me happy by commanding my services.

Will you be so good, Sir, as to return my most respectful thanks for the diploma with which I am honored by the society instituted with you for the encouragement of the study of Natural history? I am afraid it will never be in my power to contribute anything to the object of the institution. Circumstances have thrown me into a very different line of life; and not choice as I am happy to find in your case. In the year 1781, while confined to my room by a fall from my horse, I wrote some Notes in answer to the inquiries of M. de Marbois as to the natural & political state of Virginia. They were hasty & un

digested; yet as some of these touch slightly on some objects of it's natural history, I will take the liberty of asking the society to accept a copy of them. For the same reason, & because too they touch on the political condition of our country, I will beg leave to present you with a copy, and ask the favor of you to find a conveyance for them from London to Edinburgh. They are printed by Stockdale, bookseller Piccadilly, and will be ready in 3 or 4 weeks from this time. I will direct him to deliver two copies to your order. Repeating constantly the proffer of my services, I shall only add assurances of the esteem & attachment with which I am Dear Sir your friend &

servt.

TO EDWARD RUTLEDGE.1

PARIS July 14, 1787. DEAR SIR,-I received your favor of the 14th of October in the moment I was setting out on a tour of the seaport towns of this country, from which I have been not long returned. I received it too with that kind of heartfelt pleasure which always attends the recollection of antient affections. I was glad to find that the adoption of your rice to this market was considered worth attention as I had supposed it. I set out from hence impressed with the idea the ricedealers here had given me that the difference between your rice & that of Piedmont proceeded from a difference in the machine for cleaning it. At Marseilles I hoped to know what the Piedmont machine was : but

1 From the original in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

I de

I could find nobody who knew anything of it. termined therefore to sift the matter to the bottom by crossing the Alps into the rice country. I found the machine exactly such a one as you had described to me in Congress in the year 1775. There was but one conclusion then to be drawn, to wit, that the rice was of a different species, & I determined to take enough to put you in seed:

They informed me however that it's exportation in the husk was prohibited; so I could only bring off as much as my coat & surtout pockets would hold. I took measures with a muletier to run a couple of sacks across the Appenines to Genoa, but have not great dependance on it's success. The little therefore which I brought myself must be relied on for fear we should get no more, and because also it is genuine from Vercelli where the best is made of all the Sardinian Lombardy, the whole of which is considered as producing a better rice than the Milanese. This is assigned as the reason of the strict prohibition. Piedmont rice sold at Nice (the port of its exportation) when I was there at 17 livres French, the French hundredweight. It varies from time to time. as the price of wheat does with us. The price of Carolina rice at Bordeaux, Nantes, Lorient & Havre varies from 16 to 24 the French quintal, which is equal to 109 lb. our weight. The best ports to send it to are Bordeaux & Havre (or Rouen which is the same thing as Havre) but it is essential that it arrive here a month before the commencement of Lent, when the principal demand is made for it. Carolina

rice after being sorted here into several qualities, sells from 6 sols to 10 sols the French pound, retail, according to the quality. quality. Unsorted and wholesale

about 30 the French quintal.

Piedmont rice is but of one quality, which sells retail at 10 sous the Fr. pound, & wholesale is about 3 or 4* dearer than yours. In order to induce your countrymen to ship their rice here directly, I have proposed to some merchants here to receive consignments allowing the consignor to draw on the moment of shipping for as much as he could sell for on the spot & the balance when it should be sold. But they say that is impossible. They are to consider & inform me what are the most favorable terms on which they can receive it. I am told that freight insurance & commission are about 4# the Fr. quintal, to a seaport town. I have written so long a letter on the subject of rice to Mr. Drayton for the society of agriculture, that I will trouble you with no farther particulars but refer you to that. Indeed I am sensible I have written too much on the subject. Being absolutely ignorant of it myself, it was impossible for me to know what particulars merited communication. I thought it best therefore to communicate everything. After writing that letter, I received one from Mr. Izard, by which I found that he had examined the rice-process in Lombardy. He was so much more capable than myself of giving the details that I had at one moment determined to suppress my letter. However observing that he considered the rice of Piedmont to be of the same species with yours, and

suspecting myself certainly that it is not, I determined to hazard my letter and all those criticisms which fall justly on an ignorant person writing on a subject to those much more learned in it than himself. A part of my letter too related to the olive tree & caper, the first of which would surely succeed in your country & would be an infinite blessing after some 15 or 20 years; the caper would also probably succeed & would offer a very great and immediate profit. I thank you for your obliging mention of my worthless Notes on Virginia. Worthless & bad as they are they have been rendered more so, as I am told, by a translation into French. That I may have neither merit nor demerit not my own, I have consented to their publication in England. I advised the bookseller to send 200 copies to Philadelphia & 200 to Richmond, supposing that number might be sold in the United States: but I do not know whether he will do it. If you give me leave I will send you a copy of the original impression.-I congratulate you, my dear friend, on the law of your state for suspending the importation of slaves, and for the glory you have justly acquired by endeavoring to prevent it forever. This abomination must have an end, and there is a superior bench reserved in heaven for those who hasten it. The distractions of Holland thicken apace. They begin to cut one another's throats heartily. I apprehend the neighboring powers will interfere: but it is not yet clear whether in concert, or by taking opposite sides. It is a poor contest, whether they shall have one, or many masters. Your nephew is arrived