As with the previous year, it is not an easy matter to make out the accounts satisfactorily; there were items that were of questionable relationship toward investment or yearly expenditure; there were kinds of profit difficult of estimation, and, as usual, there were sundry matters altogether forgotten. If there is any one point more important than another in recording the experiences of an individual in any pursuit, when these experiences are to be the guide of others, it is absolute exactness in figures and calculations. I have, therefore, been exceedingly careful, and devoted much consideration to every item ere it was inserted, and I flatter myself that the following statement may be relied upon confidently:
Cost of premises $15,000 Three hundred loads of fertilizer 180 Strawberry plants 3 New teeth 50 Dandy Jim 450 ------- Total $15,683
Value of premises $16,000 Dandy Jim 50 New teeth 100 Strawberry bed 50 ------- Total $16,200
Asparagus $ 6 00 Seeds 10 50 Subscription to Skating-pond 10 00 Damage to wagon 50 00 ------- Total $ 76 50
One quart of strawberries $ 50 One hundred bushels (estimated) of onions 50 00 Ten egg-plants 2 50 One peck Daniel O’Rourke peas 2 00 One thousand squashes 100 00 Five hundred cucumbers 20 00 One hundred pumpkins 25 00 Five cauliflowers 2 50 Fifty bushels of tomatoes 25 00 Beets, beans, turnips, etc. 50 00 ------- Total $277 50
There are some items in the foregoing accounts that require explanation. The manure was included in permanent capital, because it went into the ground, became incorporated with it, and added just so much additional value to it. The strawberries, having now proved successful, ceased to be a current expense, but entered into the total cost. The new teeth referred to are not for the rakes, as might be supposed, but for myself. Having heretofore mentioned some of Dandy Jim’s peculiarities, I omitted an explanation of our last association and final separation. I was not fond of driving the gallant steed--so gallant that he usually danced twenty feet to one side, and stood on his hind legs whenever he saw the dress of a woman--but I was occasionally forced to make use of his services. The train happening to give out, and being pressed to attend to some business in town, I had him harnessed, and, with some misgivings, commenced my journey toward the city. By great care and discretion, I managed to make my way through the village, which he cleared at full run, in consequence of a sudden whistle from a locomotive attached to a dirt train; over the bridge, where he shied from one side to the other, grazing both the wheels against the heavy plank balustrade; along Jackson’s Avenue, where he bounced up and down on passing every market-wagon or hay-cart; on board the ferry-boat, to which he was only constrained by violent abuse and the physical strength of several of the hands of the boat, and where he amused himself by pawing steadily, and occasionally backing on the horse directly behind, and thus causing much excitement, bad temper, and coarse language during the entire trip; and fairly on the stone pavements of the city streets.