Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 11).djvu/129

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who, would they use it, have an influence that might work wonders in the black man's favour. But this would be treason in Maryland.

23d.—It is remarkable that the cows graze loose all over this huge metropolis, and come and go of themselves, night and morning, from and to their owners' houses and yards for milking, after which they are each fed with a quarter of a peck of corn meal.

Ignorance and love of animal indulgence, it is said, here frustrate and set at nought the system of representation. A good man, therefore, cannot get into Congress; but a bad man, not fit for a constable, often succeeds by the means of influential whiskey. Flatter vice and folly, and you are popular. I was here introduced by Mr. Elliott to the Hon. Thomas Law, (a well known republican, brother of the late Lord Ellenborough, Lord Chief Justice of England) who received me kindly, and on his courteous invitation I promised to visit him.

"Sun-flowers," says Mr. Elliott, "breathe each as much in one day as twelve men. I consider them as highly propitious to health, particularly in low and marshy situations; and I therefore surround my hermitage with them."

Sunday, 25th.—Young Rawlings, late of Chatteris, called to say that three of my simple-hearted countrymen from Gamlingay, Cambridgeshire, had {114} inquired for me, and represented me as a spy, but still thought and talked kindly of and wished to see me. By a spy, they did not mean a government spy in the common acceptation of that term. This young quaker is an assistant in a store at 300 dollars a year and board. He saves only 100 dollars, and, if he cannot become master of the concern, thinks of returning home, where he can do better.