Having been urged again & again by my neighbors to renew the effort to get a post office, I have uniformly declined doing so, if I were myself to be the post master. The attempt was made in the first instance with much reluctance, & only to gratify & accommodate my neighbors, & I felt little mortification at the failure.

I am now pressed to make application for a post office at the fork of the road within view of my dwelling ^&^ of the academy, a position more convenient for the neighbors than my house, & not less so for the school, as the ^boys^ pass it in going to & returning from school. It is proposed to have M^r Cane Strowd—who keeps store at the point, & resides there with his family—post master. He is a very worthy man, & very competent; of a very good democratic family too, though his political opinions have nothing to do with the question. My reluctance to apply

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in the first instance arose simply from the fact that I was unwilling to be troubled with the duties of the office. That objection obviated, I unite heartily with my neighbors in the desire to have an office at our doors. I don’t know a situation in the country, remote from a village, where an office is more needed. True, there is one now three miles north east, & another two miles south west on the same route (Hillsboro’ to Jamestown)I have no doubt that nine tenths of the letters to & from Clover Garden (as well as a very large majority of the papers) are to & from the officers & members of my school. Now, I do not, for my own part, desire the discontinuance of one or both of the offices above alluded to, nor do my neighbors, if the establishment of a new office here be compatible with their continuance: still I think it true that the proposed new office would do the business of both with greater advantage to the writing & reading community concerned.

I beg of you the favor to use your influence in getting us an office. My friend M^r Venable, member from this district, is acquainted with the topography of the neighborhood, & can give you any information which may be needed. You may show him this, & if he wishes to know why I did not address the representative

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of my own district, I must answer, He never had the honor of being my pupil, and I am therefore not so sure of his feeling it his duty to obey my commands. If however he will unite his efforts with yours, I shall have him a more comfortable dining room at the ‘big muster at Morrow’s ^in^ 1849.