"Elizabethtown, August 9th, 1774.

"DEAR AARON,

"I received yours by Mr. Beach, dated Sunday. I am not a little
pleased that you have the doctor (Bellamy) so completely under your
thumb. Last Saturday I went a crabbing. Being in want of a thole-pin,
I substituted a large jackknife in its stead, with the blade open and
sticking up. It answered the purpose of rowing very well; but it seems
that was not the only purpose it had to answer; for, after we had been
some time on the flats, running on the mud, as the devil would have
it, in getting into the boat I threw my leg directly across the edge
of the knife, which left a decent mark of nearly four inches long, and
more than one inch deep. It was then up anchor and away. Our first
port was Dayton's ferry, where Dr. Bennet happened to be, but without
his apparatus for sewing, to the no small disadvantage of me, who was
to undergo the operation. Mrs. Dayton, however, furnished him with a
large darning-needle, which, as soon as I felt going through my skin,
I thought was more like a gimlet boring into me; but, with the help of
a glass of wine, I grinned and bore it, until he took a few stitches
in the wound. So much for crabbing.

"I was at New-York about a fortnight since, on my way to Jamaica, Long
Island. The object of this journey you understand. I stayed at Mr.
Willett's three days, and then went to Colonel Morris's, and spent two
days there very agreeably. Nothing occurred worth relating, unless it
be some transactions of the greatest fool I ever knew.

"Mr. Elliot, collector of New-York, Mr. and Mrs. Delancey and