 | Letters of Mrs. Adams, |  |
Your favor of December 9th, came to hand this
evening from Philadelphia. By the same post I received
a letter from Mr. Lovell, transcribing some
passages from one of the same date to him, and the
only one, he says, which he has received since your
absence, and his pocket book proves, that he has
written eighteen different times; yet possibly you
may have received as few from him. The watery
world alone can boast of large packets received;—a
will not be discouraged. I will persist in writing,
though but one in ten should reach you. I have
been impatient for an opportunity, none having offered
since January, when the Alliance sailed, which,
my presaging mind assures me, will arrive safe in
France, and I hope will return as safely.
Accept my thanks for the care you take of me, in
so kindly providing for me the articles you mention.
Should they arrive safe, they will be a great assistance
to me. The safest way, you tell me, of supplying
my wants, is by drafts; but I cannot get hard
money for bills. You had as good tell me to procure
diamonds for them; and, when bills will fetch
but five for one, hard money will exchange ten,
which I think is very provoking; and I must give at
the rate of ten, and sometimes twenty, for one, for
every article I purchase. I blush whilst I give you
a price current;—all butcher's meat from a dollar to
eight shillings per pound; corn twenty-five dollars,
rye thirty, per bushel; flour fifty pounds per hundred;
potatoes ten dollars per bushel; butter twelve
shillings a pound, cheese eight; sugar twelve shillings
a pound; molasses twelve dollars per gallon;
labor six and eight dollars a day; a common cow,
from sixty to seventy pounds; and all English goods
in proportion. This is our present situation. It is a
risk to send me any thing across the water, I know;
yet, if one in three arrives, I should be a gainer. I
have studied, and do study, every method of economy
in my power; otherwise a mint of money would not
forty dollars per week apiece at a school. I there
fore thought it most prudent to request Mr. Thaxter
to look after them, giving him his board and the use
of the office, which he readily accepted, and, having
passed the winter with me, will continue through the
summer, as I see no probability of the times speedily
growing better.
We have had much talk of peace through the
mediation of Spain, and great news from Spain, and
a thousand reports, as various as the persons who
tell them; yet I believe slowly, and rely more upon
the information of my friend, than on all the whole
legion of stories which rise with the sun, and set as
soon. Respecting Georgia,[1]
other friends have written
you. I shall add nothing of my own, but that
I believe it will finally be a fortunate event to us.
Our vessels have been fortunate in making prizes,
though many were taken in the fall of the year. We
have been greatly distressed for [want of] grain. I
scarcely know the looks or taste of biscuit or flour
for this four months; yet thousands have been much
worse off, having no grain of any sort.
The great commotion raised here by Mr. Deane
has sunk into contempt for his character; and it
would be better for him to leave a country, which is
now supposed to have been injured by him. His
friends are silent, not knowing how to extricate him.
He most certainly had art enough, in the beginning,
to blow up a flame, and to set the whole continent in
agitation.
| Letters of Mrs. Adams, | |