“ The salubrity of the climate is equal also to that of any part of the United States; and the inhabitants have in consequence a healthy, ruddy appearance. The people appeared to me to be of a more frank and open disposition, more inclined to hospitality, and to live more contentedly on what they possessed than the people of the same class in any other part of the United States I passed through.
“Along these mountains live several gentlemen of large landed property, who farm their own estates, as in the lower parts of Virginia; among the number is Mr. Jefferson. ”

“ The season, however, was unfavorable, and rendered traveling difficult and laborious; besides, experience taught me that traveling in winter never offered the greatest satisfaction we can enjoy—that of seeing Nature as she ought to be, and of forming a just idea of the general face of a country; for it is easier for the imagination to deprive [40] the landscape of the charms of spring than to clothe with them the hideous skeleton of winter; as it is easier to imagine what a beauty at eighteen may be at eighty, than to conceive what eighty was at eighteen. ”

“ A Frenchman who has bought 300 acres of land thinks he has a ‘property,’ and goes to work on the grand [89] scale. What with building and embellishments he is very apt to go bankrupt. There are men in this region who have made fortunes in land speculations. There is not a tavern at Winchester where land merchants may not be found. They are as enthusiastic in their offers as the women who sell toothpicks at the doors of Paris restaurants and cafés. ”

“ M. de Chastellux was a good traveler. In the country, if the bacon and eggs were stale and the vintage was spring water of the morning, he found something to admire in the landscape. At Philadelphia he dined with members of the Congress, of all parties, listened to political theories, drank tea with the ladies, was easily amused and formed opinions which may be discovered on a careful reading. Where is there a more sensible man than the old campaigner? The Marquis of Chastellux entered the army at fifteen, and was given command of a regiment at twenty-one. ”

“ On the way to Richmond, by the road through Goochland Courthouse, Anburey met that perennial, the celebrated roundabout directions: “If perchance you meet an inhabitant and enquire your way, his directions are, if possible, more perplexing than the roads themselves, for he tells you to keep the right-hand path, then you’ll come to an old field; you are to cross that, and then you’ll come to the fence of such a one’s plantation; then keep that fence, and you’ll come to a road that has three forks; keep the right-hand fork for about half a mile, and then you’ll come to a creek ”

“ Washington, on my second journey to it wore a very dreary aspect. The multitude had gone to their homes, and the inhabitants of the place were few. There were no objects to catch the eye but a forlorn pilgrim forcing his way through the grass that overruns the streets, or a cow ruminating on a bank, from whose neck depended a bell, that the animal might be found the more readily in the woods. I obtained accommodations at the Washington Tavern, which stands opposite the Treasury. ”

“ On the eastern side of the Ridge, cotton grows extremely well; and in winter snow scarcely ever remains upon the ground more than a day or two at a time. On the other side cotton never comes to perfection, and in every farmyard you see sleighs or sledges. On the eastern side of the Blue Ridge, in Virginia, not one of these carriages is to be met with.
“Another circumstance may also be mentioned (besides the contrast in the soils) as making a material difference between the country on one side of the Blue Ridge and that on the other, namely, that behind the mountains the weevil is unknown. ”

“ The quarter-racing of Southern Virginia and North Carolina struck Smyth as being a strange institution. Many early travelers devote a page or two to the quarter-race, a match between two horses to run one-quarter of a mile straight out. Smyth observes: “They have a breed in Virginia that performs it with astonishing velocity, beating every other for that distance with great ease; but they have no bottom. However, I am confident that there is not a horse in England, nor perhaps the whole world, that can excel them in rapid speed ”

“ In the lower parts of Virginia, and the other states where the weevil is common, they always thresh out the grain as soon as the crops are brought in, and leave it in the chaff, which creates a degree of heat sufficient to destroy the insect. According to the general opinion, the weevil originated on the eastern shore of Maryland, where a person, in expectation of a great rise in the price of wheat, kept over all his crops for the space of six years, when they were found full of these insects. ”

“ The commodity most in demand is tobacco; you well know the character it has, and for common use it may be considered as the best in the world. What the English imported yearly from this State, and from Maryland, might have amounted to about ninety-six thousand hogsheads; but among themselves they did not consume one sixth part of that quantity, and either disposed of the rest among us, or exported it to the north [of Europe] ; judge then how valuable this commerce was to that nation. ”

“ The inspection of tobacco in Virginia, and especially on James River, is esteemed to be conducted with a degree of exactness and severity, which contributes as much as the real superiority of the article itself to keep up its price in the market. The hogsheads are broken at the warehouse, and examined in every direction and in every part. The tobacco is then repacked in its hogshead, which is branded with a hot iron, marking the place of inspection and the quality of the contents. The planter receives a certificate of the particulars. ”

“ Bred to arms, he has not neglected the study of politics, and there is probably no one in America who has a better knowledge of the present condition of the United States or more sincerely desires their welfare. May Heaven spare him many years for the good of his country, for an example to it and to Europe. ”

“ After having got into the ferry-boat the man of the house, as if conscious that he had given me very bad fare, told me that there was a bank of oysters in the river, close to which it was necessary to pass, and that if I chose to stop the men would procure abundance of them for me. ”

“ The little that is sent for inspection is reckoned to be of the very best quality, and is all engaged for the London market. In the town the houses bear evident marks of the siege; and the inhabitants will not, on any account, suffer the holes perforated by the cannon balls to be repaired on the outside. Till within a year or two the broken shells themselves remained; but the New England men that traded to York, finding they would sell well as old iron, dug them up and carried them away in their ships. Twelve miles from York, to the westward, stands Williamsburg. ”

“ The number of merchants who carry on a direct commerce with Europe is inconsiderable. They keep their ships at Norfolk, and send down the produce of the country in smaller vessels. The commission trade may be considered as the real business of the place. It is from the merchants of Richmond or Petersburg that those of Norfolk most commonly purchase the grain, flour and tobacco which the latter export. The country produce is paid for by the merchants in ready money or at short credit ”

“ Though many of the houses in the Northern Neck are built of brick and stone, in the style of the old English manor houses, yet the greater number there and throughout Virginia are of wood, amongst which are all those that have been built of late years. This is chiefly owing to a prevailing, though absurd, opinion, that wooden houses are the healthiest, because the inside walls never appear damp. Tobacco is not near so much cultivated now as it was formerly, the great demand for wheat having induced most of the planters to raise that grain in preference. ”

“ Very few of the planters possess more than 2,000 acres of land, and few even so much. Alexandria is, beyond all comparison, the handsomest town in Virginia, and, indeed, is among the finest in the United States. Alexandria carries on a constant trade with the West India Islands, and also some with Europe. There is a bank at Alexandria, the only one in Virginia. The establishment of a bank at Richmond was authorized by the Legislature of Virginia in December, 1792, but the subscriptions not filling it does not exist. ”

“ The higher Virginians seem to venerate themselves as men. Whatever may be advanced against Virginians, their good qualities will ever outweigh their defects; and when the effervescence of youth has abated, when reason asserts her empire, there is no man on earth who discovers more exalted sentiments, more contempt for baseness, more love of justice, more sensibility of feeling, [133] than a Virginian. At Newgate my pilgrimage was nearly at an end, for Mr. Ball’s plantation was only distant eight miles. ”

“ Tobacco, corn, flax and wheat are the principal crops. Twelve miles from Winchester I could have bought land for 50 shillings the acre, but nearer the town the price of cleared land is from three to four pounds. Several Europeans who have settled hereabouts have not succeeded well, and for the reason that they failed to discard European customs. It should not be overlooked that the price of labor and that of produce is in reverse proportion to what prevails in Europe. Here labor is high and market values, net, are low. An especial error of foreigners is the attempt to improve too fast. ”

“ One of these laws, so injurious to commerce, was passed during the war. It was enacted that all merchants and planters in Virginia, who [98] owed money to British merchants, should be exonerated from their debts if they paid the money due into the public treasury instead of sending it to Great Britain. The treasury at first did not become much richer in consequence of this law. However, when the continental paper money became so much depreciated many of the people began to look upon the measure in a different point of view. ”

“ Private subscriptions raised in all the towns of Virginia, together with further sums voted by the State Legislature and by Congress, afforded the unfortunate French incontestable proofs of the benevolence and generosity of the Americans. Major William Lindsey, commissioner of [116] the Custom House, is, of all the inhabitants of Norfolk, the individual with whom I have the most particular reason to be satisfied. He is a man recommended by simplicity of manners and goodness of heart, and is held in universal esteem. ”

“ Jefferson possesses one of those excellent threshing machines, which a few years since were invented in Scotland. He has a drilling machine, invented in his own neighborhood. Mr. Jefferson, in common with all landholders in America, imagines that his habitation is more healthy than any other; that it is as healthful as any in the finest parts of France. In private life Mr. Jefferson displays a mild, easy, and obliging manner, though somewhat cold and reserved; he possesses a stock of information not inferior to that of any other man. ”

“ All the armories throughout the United States are kept much in the same style.
“Between this place and the Blue Mountains the country is rough and hilly, and but very thinly inhabited. The few inhabitants, however, met with here are uncommonly robust and tall; it is rare to see a man amongst them who is not six feet high. These people entertain a high opinion of their own superiority in point of bodily strength over the inhabitants of the low country. A similar race of men is found all along the Blue Mountains. ”

“ I know of no American bird that has the rich, mellow note of our blackbird, the sprightly note of the skylark, or the sweet and plaintive one of the nightingale. After having listened to the mocking-bird, there is no novelty in hearing the song of any other bird in the country ”

“ Henderson, I entertained a strong inclination to pay a visit to his domain; which must certainly afford a large field for speculation and enterprise, being situated in the very heart of the continent of America, and in a great degree precluded from the general intercourse of the rest of mankind, being likewise several hundred miles from any other settlement.” This was before the establishment of the county of Kentucky in 1776. After that year the number of emigrants from the coast country was so large it is almost a matter of surprise that anybody was left in Virginia east of the mountains. ”

“ Here and there we passed large wheat fields. Several years before the war, owing to the heavy English import duties on tobacco, the people had begun to raise wheat on a more extensive scale. Here, as in other parts of America, the cornfields are seeded to wheat without removing the stalks. The weevil is bad, especially if the grain lies long in the straw. After floating off the light seed the good, heavy grain is broadcasted, mixed with shell lime. Between Fredericksburg and Richmond we noticed a good many swampy spots, which might easily be drained. ”

“ To what slight causes does a man owe some of the principal events of his life. I had been a fortnight at Alexandria, when, in consequence of the short advertisement I had put in the Gazette, a gentleman was deputed to wait on me from a Quaker, on the banks of the Occoquan, who wanted a Tutor for his children. The following evening I left Alexandria on horseback to visit the abode of Mr. Ellicott. Having crossed the bridge [at Colchester] , which is built over the Occoquan, I alighted at the door of the tavern. ”