I had not in all this time seen what we in England call a corn-stack, nor a dung-hill.  There were, indeed, behind the General’s barns, two or three cocks of oats and barley; but such as an English broad-wheeled waggon would have carried a hundred miles at one time with ease.  Neither had I seen a green plant of any kind:  there was some clover of the first year’s sowing:  but in riding over the fields I should not have known it to be clover, although the steward told me it was; only when I came under a tree I could, by favour of the shade, perceive here and there a green leaf of clover, but I do not remember seeing a green root.  I was shown no grass-hay of any kind; nor do I believe there was any.

The cattle were very poor and ordinary, and the sheep the same; nor did I see any thing I liked except the mules, which were very fine ones, and in good condition.  Mr. Gough had made a present to General Washington of a bull calf.  The animal was shown to me when I first landed at Mount Vernon, and was the first bull I saw in the country.  He was large, and very strong-featured; the largest part was his head, the next his legs.  The General’s steward was a Scotchman, and no judge of animals—­a better judge of distilling whiskey.

I saw here a greater number of negroes than I ever saw at one time, either before or since.

The house is a very decent mansion:  not large, and something like a gentleman’s house in England, with gardens and plantations; and is very prettily situated on the banks of the river Potowmac, with extensive prospects....  The roads are very bad from Alexandria to Mount Vernon.

The General still continuing at Philadelphia, I could not have the pleasure of seeing him; therefore I returned to Alexandria.

I returned [to Mount Vernon some weeks later] ... to see General Washington.  I dined with him; and he showed me several presents that had been sent him, viz. swords, china, and among the rest the key of the Bastille.  I spent a very pleasant day in the house, as the weather was so severe that there were no farming objects to see, the ground being covered with snow.

Would General Washington have given me the twelve hundred acres I would not have accepted it, to have been confined to live in that country; and to convince the General of the cause of my determination, I was compelled to treat him with a great deal of frankness.  The General, who had corresponded with Mr. Arthur Young and others on the subject of English farming and soils, and had been not a little flattered by different gentlemen from England, seemed at first to be not well pleased with my conversation; but I gave him some strong proofs of his mistakes, by making a comparison between the lands in America and those of England in two respects.