University of Virginia Library

LETTER LI.

I was obliged to conclude my last letter very abruptly,
as there was a pressing necessity for Johnny's setting off
to Richmond the instant he could get ready; bitter as the
weather was; and such I never knew at the same season. It
has proved very hard upon me, hand and foot; the rheumatism
having settled in the first wounded limb, and the nail
of the other being in the act of shedding: but, Graces à
Dieu, I make a shift to get along without quite as many
heart-aches as I have been made to feel by female caprice
and affectation.

You say nothing in your letters of the places you passed
through. Did you go through Georgetown? How did you

like the City, and Baltimore? The sight of the Chesapeake
must have been a great treat to you. It is a magnificent body
of water, and the passage from Newcastle to Philadelphia a
most pleasing novelty. I do not like your indifference to
the scenes around you: at your age, it is not natural, unless
the heart be sad, or melancholy: for which you have,
I trust, no cause as yet. What acquaintances have you
made, and how do you pass your evenings? Do you go to
the theatre, and what is the style of performance? Have
you secured your money, and in what bank? and how much
more will you want? I should have given you a letter to
Mr. Clay, but, he is three in my debt: although the first
of them demanded an immediate answer, and the other two
entreated him to furnish it. Under such circumstances, I
would not write even to him.

What say Bradford & Innskeep about the review. Let
me advise you, now and then, on a leisure day, to take a
saddle-horse from one of the livery-stables, and explore the
surrounding country. Lansdowne is well worth seeing—so
is The Woodlands, Mr. Hamilton's place; if you can obtain
an introduction, which I hope you will do through my friend,
Doctor Logan, who, I see, has returned from Europe. He
resides at Staunton, near Germantown, and is, unquestionably,
a true patriot. His family is ancient and respectable, and
his own private character, highly so. Between the upper
ferry, and the falls of Schuylkill, was my most usual shooting
ground; but both banks, as low as Hamburg House, are quite
familiar to me. I had like to have forgotten to tell you, that,
at a Mr. Bartram's, not far below Gray's ferry, on the left
of the road-side, you will find many rare and beautiful trees,
and shrubs, particularly some scarce varieties of the pinus
tribe.

Yesterday, just at the south-east corner of my pasture
fence, I came upon a fine flock of turkeys. They were
going from the ditch, towards the river. I fired, and so did
Tudor, but our shot (No. 9,) were too small, and the turkeys
flew over the river. Woodcocks are now pretty plentiful

in the slash, at the Middle Quarter, near the lower big
spring: but I made a bungling hand yesterday of killing them,
having got only one at four shots. On Sunday I bagged five
and a half brace of partridge—and lost four. Tudor bagged
one and a half.

The rain prevented my setting out for Bizarre this morning.
Beverley and his wife desire to be remembered kindly
to you, as I do to my old friend Tom. She is a good creature
as ever breathed; knows nothing of megrims, hartshorn,
spirits of lavender, laudanum, nor fits. By the way, I mean
to take out a patent for curing the last: although they be the
"true genuine convulsion fits, to be had only of the maker."

Adieu, dear Theodore.