Des Arc citizen., 1858-12-18
WAsHINGToN AS A FARMER.

TOT country He, anu niS haoitS aS iaiihei will interest our readers, if they love their farms as he did his. Iia si6n vlav 4
 In his letter from Mount Vernon he writes: II am now believe, fixed in this seat, and Ihope to find more happiness in retirement than ever experienced in the wide and bustling world"
 | q, This was deliberate purpose with him the result of enduring inclinations. - Throughout the whole course of his ca reer. agricultural life appears to have been his beau ideal of existence, which haunted his thoughts, even amid the stern duties of the field, and to which he 'recurred with unfagging interest, whenever enabled to indulge his natural bias. Mount Vernon was his harbor of repose where he re- pealedly furled his sail, and fancied him self anchored for life. No impulse of ann bition tempted him thence; nothing but the call of country, and his devotion to the public good. The place was endeared to him by the rememberance of his brother and of the happy days he had passed here with that brother in, the day of his boy hood; but 1t was delightful place in itself and we'll calculated to inspire the rural lfeeling. baHt | The mansion was beautifully situated on a swelling height, crowned with wood, and commanding magnificent view up and down the Potomac. The grounds im- mediately about 1t were laid out somewhat in the English taste. The estate was ap- portioned into separate farms. devoted to different kinds of culture. Much, howev- CT, was still covered with wild woods and intented with inlets; haunts of deer and barking-paces of foxes. "No estate in United America observes he in one of his letters, lis more pleasantly situated. h high and healthy country, in a lati- Jude between the extremes of heat and cold; on one of the finest rivers in the world-a river we'll stocked with various kinds of fish at all seasons of the year and in the spring with shad, herring, bass, carp, sturgeon, etc, in great abundance. The borders of the estate are washed by more than ten miles of tide water; the whole shore, in fact Is one entire fishery
 Washington carried into his rural af. fairs the same method, activity and cir. cumspection that had distinguished him in military life. q He kept his own accounts posted up his books, and balanced them with mercantile exactness. The products of his estate, also, became so noted for the 1faithfulness, as to quality and quantity
 with which they were put up that it is said any barrel of flour that bore the brand ol George Washington, Mount Vernon; was exempt from the customary inspection In the West India ports. aga p4
 He was an early riser--often before day break in the winter, when the nights were long. On such occasions he lit his own fire. and wrote and read by candle flight. He breakfasted at seven in sum- mer and eight in winter. Two small cups of tea and three or four cakes of Indian meal-called hoe cakes--formed his fru. gal repast Immediately after breakfast, he mounted his horse, and visited those parts of his estate where any work was going on, seeing to everything with his own eyes, and often aiding with his own hand. Dinner was served at two. He ate heartily, but was no epicure nor crtl. cal about his food. His beverage was small beer or cider, and two glasses of old Madeira. He took tea, of which he was very fond, early in the evening, and retir- ed for the night about nine o'clock.
 | We find him working for part of two days with Peter, his smith, to make new invention. This, after two or three fail
 ures, he accomplished. Then, with less than his usual judgment, he put his twt chariot horses to the plough, and ran risl of spelling them in giving his new inven ton trial over ground thickly swarded Anon, during thunderstorm, fright |. ened negro alarms the house, with word that the mill is giving way, upon whicl there is general turnout of all the for ces, with Washington at their head wheeling and shoveling gravel, during pelting rain, to stop the rushing water.