u think it possible that there are
not Families and Taverns in Eden. that would give reasonably for young
pease and Beans in July and Aug^t if they could get them. Suppose now
you sent a dish of young pease or Beans to any of your Customers when
only old are to be had, and desire them to let their acquaintances know
you can furnish the like, don't you think they would go off, or if you
got into the custom of such as Mrs. Thom, who keeps a Tavern, do you
believe she would not find people who would be glad of them, and so
would take from you. Possibly they may not give such a price as just
when first coming in, but if you get a price you can afford them at, it
does your business.... People would presently come to distinguish as
they came in to buy when Garden stuff was first introduced. But our
people are lazie, and saying no body will buy and no body will
distinguish, is chiefly owing to the want of activity, Industry and care
in providing at all or good of their kinds, and bustling a little to
introduce and get Customers at first. We are glad of all excuses for our
sleeping on in poverty and our old jog trott. How shall things be
carried to Eden. and no body will buy in the country are often very good
difficulties and convenient enough excuses, wherein excuse is wanted. I
don't know if you have a Carrier at Orm:[82] but I am convinced one who
understood his business, would get Employment for a Cart such as the
Higlers[83] to the Gardiners who come to Covent Garden use. They would
carry things cool and clean, and one man with two horses in such a Cart,
would carry in as much as four Carriers with 4 horses carry in our
common way and if you put your things up in Baskets carefully as
Gardiners do here, by which they'l not be wet, Bruised or Broiled in the
Sun, the Cart being covered as the Garden Stuff commonly is, in carrying
to Eden. Even care in this will make them fresher and better than what
is now to be had there.

HAMPSTEAD, _3^d June_, 1735.

FOOTNOTES:

[80] His gardener's name was Charles Bell.

[81] Edinburgh.

[82] Ormiston.

[83] Costermongers.

THE PORTEOUS RIOTS (1736).

+Source.+--_Autobiography of the Rev. Dr. Alexander Carlyle,
Minister of Inveresk, 1722-1770_, p. 33. (Edinburgh and London:
1860.)

I was witness to a very extraordinary scene that happened in the month
of February or March 1736, which was the escape of Robertson, a
condemned criminal, from the Tolbooth Ch