Why doth not Commissioner Rogers of Dock, John Spurrell, Nicholas Mill, Dionifras Williams, John Croad, (he learned to be an engineer) Timothy Bailey, Matthew Trevan, Greenslade, Polby Templer, and Richmond, mention their reasons in the public papers, why they say I cannot bring a stream of water from the river Plym, in Common Wood, to Plymouth Dock. If they do mention their reasons in the public papers, then it will be plain that they do not know as well as the people in Bedlam did, which they would have boiled their doctor, if they had not been hindered from doing it, for they said it was to make their broth fatter and better: these have been believed, as John Pode was, because he damn'd himself concerning the contract. He asked me in Plymouth market, before several people, why I did not mention his name in the public papers, as I did others; I asked him if he was afraid to pay any of his god for an advertisement, for fear the devil would then fetch him away. I can bring a stream of water to Dock with as much ease as I brought a stream of water to Trevan's house. I shewed how the gun could be done before Sir Charles Frederick, that a soldier can march three months, if it rain the whole time, and his gun will be always fit to fire. I told how the Fame man of war could be heav'd from the rock with a small expence; they did get her off with a large expence. I told how it could be made navigable within one mile of the borough of Plympton. I told how the bridge could be built at Lophill. I told how the Docks could be measured in Plymouth Dock-Yard, that they might know what it cost in drawing the water out of the Docks, with the horses, for twenty or thirty years last past: the book concernignthe horses can be examined, for it is day-labour. I Measured Egg-Buckland Down for a race, and there there is two miles and a quarter of good ground fit for a race; others that had tried to measure the Down for a race, and could not do it, said I was not in my right senses, and that it was impossible for me to do the work; therefore I measured the down, and put poles there, that the people might see they were liars that said I was not in my right senses. When the Victory man of war was lost, it was thought that one or more of the guns, on the lower deck, broke loose, and broke a hole in her side; but had the wheels of the carriage of the guns been lock'd, as they do the wheels of the waggons, as they draw them down the hill, then there could happen no such damage to a ship in a storm.
SAMPSON GRILLS
Plymouth, January 19, 1773
Page created on 8 Jul 2000, last modified 20 Mar 2001 and published