Rice......................$ 1.73 1/2

      Molasses..................  1.73     (Cheapest form of the

                                            saccharine.)

      Rye meal..................  1.04 3/4

      Indian meal...............  0.99 3/4 (Cheaper than rye.)

      Pork......................  0.22

  (All Experiments Which Failed)

      Flour.....................  0.88 (Costs more than Indian meal,

                                        both money and trouble.)

      Sugar.....................  0.80

      Lard......................  0.65

      Apples....................  0.25

      Dried apple...............  0.22

      Sweet potatoes............  0.10

      One pumpkin...............  0.06

      One watermelon............  0.02

      Salt......................  0.03

Yes, I did eat $8.74, all told; but I should not thus unblushingly
publish my guilt, if I did not know that most of my readers were
equally guilty with myself, and that their deeds would look no
better in print. The next year I sometimes caught a mess of fish for
my dinner, and once I went so far as to slaughter a woodchuck which
ravaged my bean-field- effect his transmigration, as a Tartar would
say- and devour him, partly for experiment's sake; but though it
afforded me a momentary enjoyment, notwithstanding a musky flavor, I
saw that the longest use would not make that a good practice,
however it might seem to have your woodchucks ready dressed by the
village butcher.

  Clothing and some incidental expenses within the same dates,
though little can be inferred from this item, amounted to

                                          $  8.40 3/4

  Oil and some household utensils.........   2.00

So that all the pecuniary outgoes, excepting for washing and
mending, which for the most part were done out of the house, and their
bills have not yet been received- and these are all and more than
all the ways by which money necessarily goes out in this part of the
world- were

  House...................................$ 28.12 1/2

  Farm one year...........................  14.72 1/2

  Food eight months.......................   8.74

  Clothing, etc., eight months............   8.40 3/4

  Oil, etc., eight months.................   2.00

                                            -----

  In all..................................$ 61.99 3/4

I address myself now to those of my readers who have a living to
get. And to meet this I have for farm produce sold

                                          $ 23.44

  Earned by day-labor.....................  13.34

                                            -----

  In all..................................$ 36.78

which subtracted from the sum of the outgoes leaves a balance of
$25.21 3/4 on the one side- this being very nearly the means with
which I started, and the measure of expenses to be incurred- and on
the other, beside the leisure and independence and health thus
secured, a comfortable house for me as long as I choose to occupy it.

  These statistics, however accidental and therefore uninstructive
they may appear, as they have a certain completeness, have a certain
value also. Nothing was given me of which I have not rendered some
account. It appears from the above estimate, that my food alone cost
me in money about twenty-seven cents a week. It was, for nearly two
years after this, rye and Indian meal without yeast, potatoes, rice, a
very little salt pork, molasses, and salt; and my drink, water. It was
fit that I should live on rice, mainly, who love so well the
philosophy of India. To meet the objections of some inveterate
cavillers, I may as well state, that if I dined out occasionally, as I