m'

¦Waitam .^mxth lEaaou

BIRKBECK'S.
REPLY TO COBBETT,
8;c. 8)C.

CHARLES WOOD, Printer,
Poppin's Court, Fleet Street, London.

EXTRACTS FROM
A SUPPLEMENTARY LETTER
FHOM THE
ILLINOIS; AN
ajiiit($!9 to 33riti0ti #inigtant!5;
AND
A REPLY TO
THE REMARKS OF
WILLIAM COBBETT, Esq.
BY
MORRIS BIRKBECK.
I^^tontr iSiiition.

LOND ON:
PRINTED FOR JAMES RIDGWAV, PICCADILLY.
t.
MDCCCXIX.

EXTRACTS FROM A
SUPPLEMENTARY LETTER
FttoM
THE ILLINOIS.
Sent to England for Publication, January 31 > 1819.

The interest which has been excited by
the voluntary expatriation of an obscure
individual shows, that the thing itself is of
importance, when considered in connection
with its causes. The exposure of these
causes has been imputed to me as an act
of hostility to my native country, by those,
who identify the government with the
people. This imputation is unjust and
extremely painful; for, though no longer
a subject of the British Government, I
am bound to my countrymen by ties of
afiection, to be broken by that stroke only,
B

2
which must sever me from all the inte-^
rests of mortality. But I make no apo
logy. Hoping to do good, it became my
duty to publish : and who apologises for
the performance of a duty ?
In my solicitude for the well-being
of our colony, I have deprecated the for
malities practised in lieu of Religion. I
have therefore been deemed a foe to Reli
gion — that bond which connects the soul
of man with the Supreme Intelligence, "in
whom we live, and move, and have our
being." It is the love of God in
creasing our good will toward each other.
It is a principle of action aiding the moral
sense : a divine sentiment, impelling us to
pursuits which reason approves, and re
straining us from evil. If I have written
in disparagement of this principle, I plead
guilty. It has been reported in the Eastern
States, that all our bright prospects have
vanished, and that we have been visited
by every calamity, physical and moral ,^
by famine, disease, and strife : that the
sound havie been too few to nurse the sick,
and the living scarcely able ta bury the

dead : and that we are an immoral and
licentious crew, tearing each other by in
cessant broils and contention. "On the
contrary, we have had an abundant supply
of all the necessaries of life, and have
experienced no extraordinary visitations
of disease or mortality. And as to dissen-
tions and immorality, if instances of the
former have occurred, it is because the
latter is the object of our abhorrence.
On the whole, we are prosperous, far
beyond my own expectations. With re
gard to pecuniary success, the capitalist is
commencing his operations, or looking
around him undecided as to the course he
shall pursue, but the labourer has made
an establishment. It is not with him as
with the capitalist, a state of hope merely,
from good prospects; but of enjoyment,
from good possessions. Numbers of this
class, and of mechanics, have already
realized their little freeholds, and are
building cabins for themselves. The fruits
of their labour are not squandered in dis
sipation and excess, because they have
higher objects, and considering their for
mer depressed condition, it is astonishing
B 2

to me, as it is honourable to them, thait
they betray no arrogance in their advance
to independence.
Unfortunately for the early domestic
arrangements of all classes, the female
departments must remain vacant for a
time^ or scantily supplied. We have re
ceived large importations of British goods
by way of New Orleans. This our na-^
tural channel of intercourse with Europe
is at present greatly obstructed by the
irregularities and impositions attending the
steam boat navigation, arising from the
want" of due competition. One hundred
and ten dollars are paid for a passage
from New Orleans to Shawnee Town, and
from four and a half to six cents per pound
for merchandize. But a steam boat of
seven hundred tons burthen is building at
Louisville^ to ply between that place and
New Orleans, besides numbers of smaller
burthen now on the stocks^ to the amount
I understand of nearly a hundred ; this
constitutes an unprecedented demand for
ship carpenters ; and it is expected with
confidence, that the rates of freight on the
Mississipi and Ohio will be reduced one

5
half the next summer. Packages sent
from England should be strong, if possible
water tight, and of moderate weight, say
two hundred pounds. The weight of each
package should be fairly marked on it.
And it should be especially remembered
by all, who make shipments to this country,
that unless an invoice accompanies the
goods, specifying the contents and value
of each package, enormous expense and
damage will be incurred. New articles,
although not designed for sale, are liable
to a duty of from sixteen and a half to
thirty-three per cent, on the original cost,
but articles which have been used are ad-r
mitted duty free.
In general, I think it better to bring
letters of credit, or other convertible
funds, than merchandize. Bedding, ap
parel, kitchen utensils, and other tools,
things which are in immediate requisition
on arrival, should accompany the settler.
An erroneous opinion has generally
prevailed, both in England and the Eastern
States, that all prairies partake more or
less of the nature of swamps : that they
are, in fact, morasses top w^t for the

6
growth of timber. Whereas, in this coun
try, prairies frequently occupy the highest,
the driest, and generally the most fertile
portions of the surface, river bottoms ex
cepted. Why one portion of the Earth's
surface, when in a state of nature, should
be covered with trees, and another por
tion with herbage only : why prairies
should prevail from the Wabush westward,
and Dup forests to the east : why in the
south-east of Europe and in South Ame--
rica there should be vast regions, ubi
nulla campis arbor cestiva recreatur aura,
not producing tree or shrub, is a problem
yet to be solved. Or, is the forest a more
natural covering than the green turf?
Let that point b^ first decided. The hap~
piest for man is a due proportion of each,
as is the case in the country we have
chosen. It is only of late that this de
scription of land has attracted the notice
of the Americans, and its value is as yet
but imperfectly appreciated. I am per
suaded, that my countrymen will find it
peculiarly adapted to their habits, and I
have therefore taken pains to lay before
them its advantages. That my motives

should have been misconstrued by some,
neither surprises nor offends me. The
substantial good, that has already been
effected, affords ample compensation. In
the statements I have published, I see
little to correct, as far as my observation
and experience have now proceeded, ex
cepting, that, in my view of the profits of
cultivation to early settlers, I have not
made sufficient allowance in time for the
iftnumerable delays and disappointments
inseparable from new undertakings in a
new country. A year of preparatory and
unproductive exertion should be added to
the debtor side of the account at the
outset. Our precursors of the hunting tribe, as
I anticipated, are now " clearing out" in
good earnest : selling their little " im
provements," and moving forward into
the wilderness. There is nothing conge
nial in their habits with those of our
people ; yet, greatly to the honour of
both, no quarrels of any importance have
occurred.

AN

ADDRESS

TO

BRITISH EMIGRANTS

AEEIVING IN

THE EASTERN STATES.
Published in New York:,

English Prairie, July 13, 1819.
My Friends and Countrymen ;
For your service I exhi
bited, in two publications, an outline of
the process of emigration, from its com
mencement up to the final settlement.
My first opinion of this, the spot of our
choice, and the reasoning on which that
choice was grounded, are before you, and
Sufficient time has elapsed to try those
opinions by the test of experience, by

10
which they are confirmed in every impor
tant particular. I showed you my own
track through the gloomy forest into a
delightful country, better prepared for an
abode by the hand of nature than the
heavy woods by half a century of labour,
I built me a cabin, and " belayed a road to
it;" for it was my ambition to be sur
rounded by my old friends and neighbours.
In this too I am gratified, and we are con
tented with our allotment, both as to our
present state and future prospects.
This small district, which two years ago
was nearly without inhabitants, contains
a thriving population of from six to seven
hundred persons. We have been blessed
with health most unusual for a new settle
ment, or for any settlement of equal num--
hers in any country : and no doubt is en^
tertained by us, or by any judicious ob
server, of its salubrity. We have several
wells of excellent Avater, and many more
are in progress. Our soil is fertile beyond
my own expectation ; but our exertions
have hitherto been chiefly directed to the
permanent objects of building and fencing,
of which much has already been done.

11
We have however collected a stock of
hogs and cattle ; and I think more acres of
corn are now growing than there are indi
viduals in the settlement.
I have been informed, that the active
pen of Mr. Cobbett has been borrowed by
certain land speculators to divert your
course from the western country to a
settlement in the back woods of Pennsyl
vania, on the Susquehannah, one hundred
and seventy miles north-west of Philadel
phia. I have not yet been so fortunate as
to meet with the publication. Report says,
that h^ holds me out as a man of infirm
judgment, and has descended so far as to
throw a doubt on my veracity ; the latter
I can hardly credit; but however that may
be, the question, both as regards my judg
ment and veracity in this instance, is de
cided, and in my favour, on the incontro
vertible evidence of fact. The Susque
hannah may, for aught I know, be quite
eligible for you ; but unfair means taken
by the promoters of any undertaking to
depress a competitor, shakes, and ought
to destroy all confidence in their honour
and truth. I have just received a publi-

12
cation on this subject by a Dr. Johnson,
who, by misapplication of partial extracts
and dishonest comments, has laboured to
show, that this country is not such as I
have stated it to be; but that I have
chosen a bad situation, and described it as
a good one. This gives me a mean opin
nion of Dr. Johnson.
But it is the interest of these speculators
to fix you on their lands, and their pro
posals may be worth your attention; there
fore, as the distance is comparatively small
from the eastern ports, I advise you to
examine the thing for yourselves, or at
least to obtain an account of it through
honest hands. If you are poor, I would
recommend you to find out some of the
Susquehannah proprietors, who may pos-5
sibly undertake to pay the charges of a
journey thither, should you find Dr. John-i
son's favourable report as false as I know
his unfavourable to be, I hear of adver
tisements in the daily papers., inviting
settlers ; but why do annual thousands of
New York and Pennsylvanian farmers pass.
these eligible settlements at their own
doors, and make their way into the west^

13
even as far as this place? I feel no
anxiety as to the peopling of this neigh
bourhood ; our prosperity is out of the reach
of Mr. Cobbett or Dr. Johnson ; but I
think it right to offer these hints to your
attention. It would be well for you to inform your
selves what the Emigrant Society consists
of, which professes so much good will to
wards you.
The Preface to Dr. Johnson's book is
called an address to you from this Society,
but it is not authenticated either by signa
ture or date.
It is probable, that the owners of the
lands in question are the " Emigrant
Society ; " if so, you will understand the
whole affair. M. BIRKBECK.

A
LETTER To
WILLIAM COBBETT, ESQ.
IN
REPLY TO
HIS REMARKS ON
MR. BIRKBECK'S TWO PUBLICATIONS.

Wanborough English Prairie, July 31, 1819.
SIR;
The Letters, in which you
have done me the honour of noticing my
two publications on this country, have
only reached my hand this day, and that
by accident; a circumstance, which will
account to you for the tardiness of my
Reply. Indeed, were it not for the pur
pose of correcting some passages where

16
my veracity seems to be the point at Issue,
I should not have considered any reply
needful. You, Sir, are an eminent caricaturist,
and have exercised your talent on this
occasion, as you have on others innumer
able, with considerable effect. But your
success is not to be envied ; for the mo
ment the exaggeration is discovered, the
effect ceases, and your credit as an honest
writer suffers in proportion.
You have given the Public your first
year's history, and I have described things
as I went along, to the best of my judg
ment. In your mode you have the ad
vantage of following your experience, and
are of course perfectly safe, if you keep
good hold of your pen. I have not,
however, much to regret, *' as my anti
cipations have proved correct in every
important particular, with one exception,
and that is in regard to time." The delays
and disappointments at the commence
ment of a settlement, remote from all old
establishments, consume more time than
had entered into my calculations. Of this
error I have taken due care to apprise the

17
Public through various channels : but with
the general correctness of the result, in
other respects, I am quite satisfied.
I shall now recal your attention to some
paragraphs in your Letters, placing the
numbers in the margin.
591. You have seen prairies in Canada,
and you have seen loyalists from Con
necticut well settled on those prairies.
They were surrounded by British soldiers,
who were *' by no means shy ;" who
*' drank their Coffee and grog by gallons,
and ate their fmvls, pigs, sausages, and
sweetmeats by wheelbarrow loads," and
" still they sighed for Connecticut." They
had " beautiful corn fields," and were as
" happy as people could be as to ease and
plenty;" still they were dissatisfied, not
withstanding the efforts of yourself and
your comrades to console them. But since
you have seen my publications you have
discovered, that they were wretched be
cause it was on prairies they were settled.
And it is thus that you " write down" the
prairies of Illinois. But, Sir, the prairies
of Illinois are as I have described them,
rich, beautiful, healthy ; and we, who are

18
settled on them, are not dissatisfied, or
sighing even for Old England : on the
contrary, contented ourselves, we are
anxious to induce those whom we love
best to follow our example.
516 to 579. Far from being a general
declaimer in favour of emigration, I would
dissuade persons,- whose dispositions or
circumstances unfit them for it; and al
most in the words which you have uncon
sciously adopted. Emigration you allow
to be good for some ; of this your own
example is an evidence. I thought it
good for me; and published my case, be-
C£mse I knew many, who were in a similar
condition, and I wished for society. The
dangers and difficulties, which we over
came so easily in theory, have not proved
more formidable in fact ; and we are now
in possession of those " beautiful mea
dows," which were to reward our toil, and
pur " fine freehold domain" lies smiling
around us. Thus the experiment has suc
ceeded. 580, 581. The quotation from my Pre
face, in the first of these paragraphs, is,
with its context, as follows : —

19
" There are, however, many of the
i'estless, whom this prescription Would suit
but badly. If low indulgence, or unsated
avarice, have soured their tempers, it is
not in a transfer from the old establish
ments of society to the silent waste, where
it scarcely is begun, that they will find a
cure. Envy or disappointed ambition — -
have these disgusted them with the world?
The wilds of Illinois will yield ho repose
to their perturbed spirits. The fiends will
migrate with them. '
" As little would I encourage the emi
gration of the tribe of grumblers, people?
who are petulant and discontented under
the every-day evils of life. Life has its
petty miseries in all situations and climates;
to be mitigated or cured by the continual
efforts of an elastic spirit ; or to be borne,
if incurable, with cheerful patience. But
the peevish emigrant is perpetually com
paring the comforts he has quitted, but
never could enjoy, with the privations of
his new allotment. He overlooks the pre
sent good, and broods over the evU with
habitual perverseness ; whilst in his recol
lection of the past he dwells on the good
c 2

20
biily. Such people are always bad asso^
eiates, but they are an especial nuisance in
an infant colony."
Now this was plainly addressed to the
tribe of grumblers, whom I left behind me
in England, earnestly exhorting them to
remain there. In your comment I find
them, to my astonishment, placed by my
side, and you gravely chiding me for treat
ing my " wailing neighbours" with too
much asperity of language !
582. Then you proceed to caricature
these unfortunate settlers under their first
difficulties, and a woful picture you make of
it. Fixed as you are to the very selvedge
of this country, your recollections of Ca
nadian prairies, and their hospitable inha
bitants, might have given your sketch a
different, and a truer character. You
allow the grumblers " whiskey and pure
water," but where are the " wheelbarrow
loads of fowls, and pigs, and sausages, and
sweetmeats?" You saw " the shed" in
Canada succeeded by a " log house," and
that by a " frame house ;" and in Canada
" they were as happy" as ease and plenty
could make them But here the shed re-

21
mains a shed : all is " misery at present
and despair of the future ! " " The apo
thecary's shop is a hundred miles off, and
a doctor nowhere :" whereas a doctor
might be of the party : and our family
medicines are the standing jest of your
brother satirists of the East. In fact, we
have a gentleman of that profession, highly
esteemed by us, and exceeded by few in his
qualifications : he has, however, almost
nothing to do ; and we sometimes fear lest
he should be compelled to quit us— ^for no
other reason.
585 and 586. Why should you talk of
our " living without bread for months,"
where wheat is to be bought at a dollar
per bushel, and flour at five or six dollars
per barrel ? And why *' without beer,"
where it is an article of common cpnsump-n
tion ? If you are ignorant of these mat
ters, why do you mention them ? Not for
the instruction of your readers, certainly.
We are not "cut off from all intercourse
with, and hope of hearing from our rela
tions and friends ;" but we are here, a
colony of relations and friends, and old
neighbours, who are constantly hearing of

22
and from the connections we have left.
A letter is a sort of common property,
from the numbers who are interested in its
contents. Friends, who used to visit at
the distance of twenty or thirty, or a hun
dred miles, are here within an easy walk.
There are neither " the seeds" nor the
fruits " of discontent" in our plan. We
help each other cordially, and feel the most
friendly interest in each other's prosperity.
We contribute to each other's enjoyment,
and we have few causes of jealousy. This
is the prevailing character of our social
band. W^e have much friendly society,
and every coming month gives us an
accession. 594. You say, that my ignorance of
the Atlantic States is my only apology for
saying, that " the Americans have no mut
ton fit to eat,"" and "regard it only as a
thing fit for dogs." Now, Sir, I have not
made so foolish an assertion, and therefore
have no need of an apology. When you
have referred to page 75 of the English
edition of my Notes, or 98 of the Ameri
can, for what I have really said on this
¦subject, where will you find an apology?

23
Perhaps you will say, that you " iirst
practised a deceit on yourself and then
upon others ; " as I presume to be the
case where you give us an instance of my
general inaccuracy with regard to prices,
that " salt will soon be at one quarter of
a dollar per bushel." " And thus" you
observe, " it goes all through." I have
mentioned the price of salt (page 126 of
the Journey) at three quarters sterling ;
and at page 7^ of the Letters, I made
the following observation.
" The demand for all the necessaries of
life increases so rapidly, that the supply
does not always keep pace with it ; and
those who want money or foresight are
sometimes compelled to pay high prices.
High prices stimulate the producer, supply
is increased, and the articles soon recover
their due level, until a similar cause ope
rates in again occasioning a temporary
scarcity, Thus salt, which might be af
forded at seventy-five cents per bushel,
now sells at two dollars and upwards."
*' And thus" say I, " it goes all
through ! "
604, 605, 606. The estimate for farm

24
buildings was made from correct working
plans ; and the prices such as I was then
contracting for and have since paid.
I am now a competent judge of these
matters from experience, and I repeat,
that a house exceedingly convenient and
comfortable, together with the requisite
farm buildings, including (613) corn cribs,
may be executed well for one thousand five
hundred dollars. Really Sir, you must
allow me to understand this one parti
cular subject better than yourself, or the
building carpenter " two miles from New
York." 608. The glorious occasion of triumph
over my simple statement is yet behind.
" One thousand eight hundred rods of
line fence for one hundred and fifty dol
lars ! " Here your eagerness to " write
me down" (you understand the applica
tion of the phrase), has hurried you be-'
yon^ a misplaced joke, as you will per
ceive. I went to Basseron Prairie, fifty miles
off, io see a young hedge of honey locust :
it was promising : I projected such a fence
for our inclosures, by sowing the seed on

25
the banks ; and the expense will be greatly
within one hundred and fifty dollars. On
referring to my memorandum, I find that
five pecks of honey locust seed, which is
something smaller than a pea, will plant
one thousand eight hundred rods, at two
inches apart. Dollars.
The seed may cost, collecting, one
dollar per peck  5
Which leaves twenty-nine dollars
per peck for planting ...... 145

Dollars 150

No levelling of banks is required ; it is
performed by the ditchers as part of their
contract ; and few or no weeds grow on
the banks for two years. " So great a
liberty with truth," you say, " never was
taken by any mortal being ;" and having
made the discovery, you are " in great
haste to conclude" your letter to me, not
to afford me an early opportunity of cor
recting it, but that your " son William
might take it to England with him,"
(par. 620), and publish it there, six months
before I could hear of it.

26
" The minds of you gentlemen that cross
the Alleghany seem to expand, as it were
to correspond with the extent of horizon
that opens to your view; but I can assure
you, that if you were to talk to a farmer
on this side of the mountains, of a field of
com of a hundred acres during the first
year of a settlement, with grassy land, and
hands scarce, you would frighten him into
a third day ague." Notwithstanding the
grateful horrors which assail you on this
occasion, the thing is feasible. The son of
an old neighbour of yours, a Hampshire
farmer, has now growing on prairie land,
** the first year," and under good hus
bandry, nearly that quantity of very pro
mising Indian corn.
611 to 615. -You talk of dunging and
ploughing, and harvesting and sowing-
wheat, and of gathering corn, and carrying
off four hundred waggon loads of corn
stalks, as of work to be performed within
thirty days, and then alarm your readers with
" a battalion of forty horse and fifty foot"
to accomplish it. Whereas dunging may be
done at any time; wheat harvest is in
June or July ; wheat sowing in Septem
ber ; corn gathering in October and No-

27
Ycmber, and the stalks are burnt on the
spot. Now, if fifty men and forty horses
will perform this in thirty days, ten men
and eight horses will do it in one hundred
and fifty days ! Pray, Sir, who is the
mnpletonf You shall speak for your
self. 614. " However, crops come stumbling
on him so fast, that he must struggle hard
not to get stifled in his own superabund
ance. He has now got two hundred acres
of corn, and one hundred acres of wheat,
which latter he has indeed had one year
before. Oh madness! But to proceed. The
hands to get in these crops, and to sow
the wheat, first taking away two hundred
acres of English coppice in stalks, will,
with the dunging for the wheat (for dung
ing, to our surprise, is wanted), require
at least fifty good 7nen, and forty good
horses or oxen, for thirty days. Faith,
when farmer Simpleton sees all this (in
his dreams I mean), he will think himself
a farmer of the rank of Job, before Satan
beset that example of patience, so worthy
of imitation, and so seldom imitated."
615. " Well, but Simpleton must bustle

28
to get in his wheat. In, indeed ; what
can cover it but the canopy of Heaven ?
A barn ! It will, at two English waggoii
loads of sheaves to an acre, require a barn
a hundred feet long, fifty feet wide, and
twenty-three feet high up to the eaves ; and
this barn, with two proper floors, will cost
more than seven thousand dollars. He
will put it in stacks ; let him add six men
to his batallion, then. He will thresh it in
the field; let him add ten more men, &c."
What a rhodomontade is here ! Why,
Sir, there have grown this year, on a
prairie, a few miles south of us, four
hundred acres of wheat, besides spring
grain ; and there are now growing seven
hundred acres of magnificent Indian corn.
The entire buildings, to which this produce
appertains, might, I believe, be erected for
fifteen hundred dollars ; whilst you are
crying out " seven thousand dollars for a
barn ! "
In the estimate of husbandry labour, I
have given the regular prices of the near
est settled neighbourhood, from the in
formation of many persons ; and I con
ceive my own authority to be at least on a

29
par with yours on this subject, where our
opportunities of knowing are equal. In
this instance, I think I have the advantage
of you. Should team labour, hereafter,
exceed the rates I have adopted, it will be
in consequence of an advance in the price
of grain, affecting the credit side of the
account in favour of the grower, in the
proportion which the consumption of the
teams bears to the entire produce.
6I7. "When I read in your Illinois
Letters that you had prepared horses,
ploughs, and other things, for putting in
a hundred acres of corn in the spring, how
I pitied you ! I saw all your plagues, if
you could not see them. I saw the grass
choking your plants ; the grubs eating
them ; and you fretting and turning from
the sight with all the pangs of baifled,
sanguine hope. I expected you to have
ten bushels instead o^ fifty per acre. I
saw your confusion, and participated in
your mortification. From these feelings
I was happily relieved by the Journal of
our friend Hulme, who informs the world,
and our countrymen in particular, that

30
you had not, in July last, any corn at all
growing." 618. " Thus it is to reckon one's'
chickens before they are hatched :
and thus the Trans-alleghanian dream
vanishes ! You have been decei\ed. A
warm heart, a lively imagination, and I
know not what caprice about Republi
canism, have led you into sanguine expect
ations and wrong conclusions." You are
mistaken. Sir ! a warm heart, or a lively
imagination, or Republican caprices, had
no concern with my ploughing, or letting
it alone. I came to this place, a soli
tary settler, about eighteen months ago,
but I was soon surrounded by neighbours.
For their accommodation buildings were
to be erected, wells to be dug, tools and
materials of every kind, as well as provi
sions, to be collected from a distance.
Every fresh arrival, in some way or other,
put my team in requisition : thus the
horses I had provided for ploughing were
better employed. My hopes were not
"baffled;" but I was engaged on more
important matters; compensating me in

31
feeling as well as in fact, for being thuis
compelled to lay aside the plough for a
season, In the mean time I proceeded
with permanent improvements, of which I
will give yon a summary, to show you that
our " Trans-alleghanian dream," as you
are facetiously styling it, is a solid reality:
for you will suppose that others have not
been idle, and that all may not have beea
diverted from cultivation, as I have been.
I have built fifteen cabins with floors of
plank, and mostly with two glazed win
dows each.
By the bye, you inform me, " and our
countrymen in particular" (paragraph
627), tbat my own " log hut," which is
a specimen of the rest, *' is such as the
free Negroes live in about here" (that is,
about North Hampstead, Long Island) ;
and " a hole it is," you say, " fit only for
dogs, or hogs, or cattle. Worse it is than
the Negro huts ; for they have a bit of
glass, but here there is none." Thus you
perceive we have escaped from the dark
smoky holes you had imagined us in, and
that a cabin with two glazed windows is
now the lowest order of our habitations.

32
But to proceed with my summary— I
have built three stables, a corn crib, hog^
sties, carpenter's shops, a forge, and'
various Other things. I have dug five
wells, from eighteen to forty-five feet deep ;
made an excellent kitchen garden, and a
good preparation for an orchard. I have
also nearly finished a large house for my
own family ; great part of which is frame,
filled in with brick. It contains thirteen
rooms, and two cellars, walled and floored
with bricks. There is also an ice house,
and a smoke house. I have ploughed
about seventy acres, partly twice, in prepa
ration for wheat. I have made about
eighteen hundred rods of ditch, four feet
wide, and three deep, with a fence of four
rails on the bank of a great part of it.
Corn may be grown to greater advantage
after these preparations than before them ;
and it is a course I would now recommend to
others. Solhaveno "confessions to make;"
and I bear your " decided condemnation
of my publications" with more equanimity
than you have predicted, because I am
tolerably sure of the approval of every
estimable person, who understands the

33
subjects In truth, Sir, I consider you on
this occasion an object of pity rather than
of anger; and it is with that. feeling that
I am obliged to inflict upon you one or
two more quotations from your Letters,
with my remarks.
Your 624th paragraph is as follows : —
*' It is of little consequence what Avild
schemes are formed and executed by men
who have property enough to carry them
hack ; but to invite men to go to the
Illinois with a few score of pounds in their
pockets, and to tell them, that they can
become/armer* with these pounds, appears
to me to admit of no other apology than
an unequivocal acknowledgment that the
invitor is mad. Yet your Fifteenth Letter
from the Illinois really contains such an
invitation. This Letter is manifestly ad
dressed to an imaginary person. It is
clear that the correspondent is a feigned,
or supposed being. The Letter is, I am
sorry to say, I think, a mere trap to catch
poor creatures with a few pounds in their
pockets." You then insert the whole of
the letter, for which I thank you, as it

34
contains good advice, and may afford use
ful information to numbers, in the very
teeth of your commentary. It is not an
" imaginary," Dear Sir, whom I address
in that Letter, but one with whose cir-
cumstances I am intimately acquainted ;
being a near relation by marriage. He is
a good farmer, and singularly qualified,
by skill and ability in manual labour, to
accomplish all I proposed. He has more
over a most notable farmerly wife, and
seven or eight fine children. You would
detain such a man, with his family and
his four hundred and fifty dollars, in Long
Island, where your neighbour Judge Law
rence might sell him one acre for three
hundred, build him a hut for one hundred
and fifty, and employ him as a labourer
afterwards. A horse laugh would hardly
cover such a blunder as this, Mr. Cobbett t
I call many a man " Dear Sir," whose
hands have been hardened by severe
labour ; and when you honour me with
the appellation, you do the like to a man,
who was probably holding the plough or
carrying the seed-lip whilst you were in

35
Canada " in your coat of bright red," ad
ministering consolation to the unfortunate
exiles from Connecticut.
629. That two persons, opposite as we
are in our habits and pursuits, should be
guided by similar principles in the choice
of a situation, would be strange indeed.
A village on Long Island may be, I doubt
not, as well adapted to your views as the
beautiful prairie on which I am now
writing is to mine ; but the extravagance
of the following passage seems indicative
of a disturbed imagination.
" And I most solemnly declare, that I
would sooner live the life of a gipsey in
England, than be a settler, with less than
five thousand pounds, in the Illinois."
You have posted me over England and
America as mad; as a simpleton, a
boaster ; and, in one or two instances, as
somethinia: worse. Your last Letter is
dated, December 15, 1818, and I suppose
was published about that time. Your
book finds its oivn way to me seven months
after, and in three more this Reply may
meet the public eye in England. Thus
you have the advantage of ten months.

jSut no rnatter; justice will overtake us at
last ; and there is a something in your
character as a writer, which is greatly in
favour of those whom you attempt to
vilify. I am. Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
M. BIRKBECK.

THE END.

CHARLES W60t>, Printer,
I'oppin's Couiit, Fleet Street, London.

YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

Gift of

WILLIAM SMITH MASON, Y 1888S

7^yf

Mason No....4'J^.^../..

Shelf No  L^.0±.

I ' "

. I.