Sometime before November 1794 Jefferson had lent the book to Edmund Randolph and in an undated letter (sent on November 6 of that year) he wrote for its return.
Randolph was unable to comply with Jefferson’s request, and on the fly-leaf of the volume he has written, signed with his initials:
This book once belonged to Mr. Jefferson. When he sent for it, I mislaid it and bought another. I have exchanged this volume
for a duplicate from the college library. E. R.
On June 24, 1813 Jefferson tried to buy a copy from Dufief, writing to him for: “
Tull’s horsehoeing husbandry. an old book in 8
vo.
”
Dufief replied on July 10: “Il m’a été impossible de trouver à Philadelphie Tull’s horsehoeing husbandry.”
In a letter to Tristram Dalton dated from Monticello on May 2, 1817, Jefferson wrote: “
. . . while I was an amateur in Agricultural science (
for practical knolege my course of life never permitted me)
I was very partial to the drilled husbandry of Tull, and thought still better of it when reformed by Young to 12 I. rows.
but I had not time to try it while young, and now grown old I have not the requisite activity either of body or mind . . .
”
Tull’s horsehoeing husbandry is on the list of agricultural books recommended by Jefferson to W. C. Nicholas on December 16, 1809, for purchase for the Library of Congress.
Jethro Tull, 1674-1741, English agricultural writer, inventor of a machine drill and advocate of drill sowing and frequent hoeing. Certain
chapters of this book were published in quarto in 1731, the first edition of the whole work in folio in 1733.
[701]
14
Spurrier’s Practical farmer.
8
vo.
1815 Catalogue, page 33. no. 33, as above.
SPURRIER,
John.
The Practical Farmer: being a new and compendious system of Husbandry, adapted to the different Soils and Climates of America.
Containing the mechanical, chemical and philosophical Elements of Agriculture. With many other useful and interesting subjects.
By John Spurrier, an old experienced Farmer, late of the County of Herts, in Great-Britain: and now of Brandywine Hundred, County of New-Castle,
and State of Delaware.
Wilmington: Printed by
Brynberg and Andrews,
1793.
S497 .S77
First Edition. 8vo. in fours. 185 leaves.
Sabin 89930.
Evans 26198.
Dedicated from Brandywine hundred, County of New-Castle, and State of Delaware, to Thomas Jefferson, Esq. Secretary of the
United States. Jefferson’s name is included in the list of Subscribers (5 copies); George Washington, President of the United
States, subscribed for 10 copies.
In a letter to John Taylor, from Monticello, December 29, 1794, Jefferson wrote: “
the horse bean I tried this last year. it turned out nothing. the President has tried it without success. an old English farmer
of the name of Spuryear, settled in Delaware, has tried it there with good success: but he told me it would not do without
being well shaded, and I think he planted it among his corn for that reason. but he acknoleged our pea was as good an ameliorater
& a more valuable pulse, as being food for man as well as horse . . .
”
[702]
15
Parkinson’s experienced farmer.
2. v.
8
vo.
1815 Catalogue, page 32. no. 34, as above.
PARKINSON,
Richard.
The Experienced Farmer, an entire new Work, in which the whole System of Agriculture, Husbandry, and Breeding of Cattle, is
explained and copiously
