employment in the South. Having received the promise of a
position in South Carolina, he embarked at New York, soon after
his graduation, on a sailing vessel bound for Savannah. On board
he met the widow of General Nathanael Greene of Revolutionary
fame, and this lady invited him to visit her plantation at
Mulberry Grove, near Savannah. What happened then is best told by
Eli Whitney himself, in a letter to his father, written at New
Haven, after his return from the South some months later, though
the spelling master will probably send Whitney to the foot of the
class:

"New Haven, Sept. 11th, 1793.

". . . I went from N. York with the family of the late Major
General Greene to Georgia. I went immediately with the family to
their Plantation about twelve miles from Savannah with an
expectation of spending four or five days and then proceed into
Carolina to take the school as I have mentioned in former
letters. During this time I heard much said of the extreme
difficulty of ginning Cotton, that is, seperating it from its
seeds. There were a number of very respectable Gentlemen at Mrs.
Greene's who all agreed that if a machine could be invented which
would clean the cotton with expedition, it would be a great thing
both to the Country and to the inventor. I involuntarily happened
to be thinking on the subject and struck out a plan of a Machine
in my mind, which I communicated to Miller (who is agent to the
Executors of Genl. Greene and resides in the family, a man of
respectibility and property), he was pleased with the Plan and
said if I would pursue it and try an experiment to see if it
would answer, he would be at the whole expense, I should loose