When he rode it was in the plainest,
least comfortable gig in Philadelphia, drawn by an ancient and
ill-formed horse, driven always by the master's own hand at a good
pace. He chose still to live where he had lived for fifty years, in
Water Street, close to the wharves, in a small and inconvenient house,
darkened by tall storehouses, amid the bustle, the noise, and the
odors of commerce. His sole pleasure was to visit once a day a little
farm which he possessed a few miles out of town, where he was wont to
take off his coat, roll up his shirt-sleeves, and personally labor in
the field and in the barn, hoeing corn, pruning trees, tossing hay,
and not disdaining even to assist in butchering the animals which he
raised for market. It was no mere ornamental or experimental farm. He
made it pay. All of its produce was carefully, nay, scrupulously
husbanded, sold, recorded, and accounted for. He loved his grapes, his
plums, his pigs, and especially his rare breed of Canary-birds; but
the people of Philadelphia had the full benefit of their increase,--at
the highest market rates.
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