TO MRS. COSWAY.
Paris, October 13, 1786.
My Dear Madam,
Just as I had sealed the enclosed, I received a letter of a good length, dated Antwerp, with your name at the bottom. I prepared myself for a feast. I read two or three sentences: looked again at the signature, to see if I had not mistaken it. It was visibly yours. Read a sentence or two more. Diable! Spelt your name distinctly. There was not a letter of it omitted. Began to read again. In fine, after reading a little, and examining the signature alternately, half a dozen times, I found that your name was to four lines only, instead of four pages. I thank you for the four lines, however, because they prove you think of me; little, indeed, but better little than none. To show how much I think of you, I send you the enclosed letter of three sheets of paper, being a history of the evening I parted with you. But how expect you should read a letter of three mortal sheets of paper? I will tell you. Divide it into six doses of half a sheet each, and every day, when the toilette begins, take a dose, that is to say, read half a sheet. By this means, it will have the only merit its length and dulness can aspire to, that of assisting your coiffeuse to procure you six good naps of sleep. I will even allow you twelve days to get through it, holding you rigorously to one condition only, that is, that at whatever hour you receive this, you do not break the seal of the enclosed till the next toilette. Of this injunction I require a sacred execution. I rest it on your friendship, and that in your first letter, you tell me honestly, whether you have honestly performed it. I send you the song I promised. Bring me in return the subject, Jours heureux! Were I a songster, I should sing it all to these words; ‘Dans ces lieux qu’elle tarde à se rendre!’ Learn it, I pray you, and sing it with feeling. My right hand presents its devoirs to you, and sees with great indignation the left supplanting it in a correspondence so much valued. You will know the first moment it can resume its rights. The first exercise of them shall be addressed to you, as you had the first essay of its rival. It will yet, however, be many a day. Present my esteem to Mr. Cosway, and believe me to be yours very affectionately,
Th: Jefferson.
M. LE ROY DE L’ACADEMIE DES SCIENCES.
Paris, November 13, 1786.
Sir,
I received the honor of yours of September the 18th, a day or two after the accident of a dislocated wrist had disabled me from writing. I have waited thus long in constant hope of recovering its use. But finding that this hope walks before me like my shadow, I can no longer oppose the desire and duty of answering your polite and learned letter. I therefore employ my left hand in the office of scribe, which it performs indeed slowly, awkwardly, and badly.
The information given by me to the Marquis de Chastellux, and alluded to in his book and in your letter, was, that the sea breezes which prevail in the lower parts of Virginia, during the summer months, and in the warm parts of-the day, had made a sensible progress into the interior country: that formerly, within the memory of persons living, they extended but little above Williamsburg; that afterwards they became sensible as high as Richmond; and that, at present, they penetrate sometimes as far as the first mountains, which are above an hundred miles further from the sea coast, than Williamsburg is. It is very rare, indeed, that they reach those mountains, and not till the afternoon is considerably advanced. A light northwesterly breeze is, for the most part, felt there, while an easterly or northeasterly wind is blowing strongly in the lower country. How far northward and southward of Virginia, this easterly breeze Takes place, I am not informed. I must, therefore, be understood as speaking of that State only, which extends on the sea coast from 36 1/2 to 38° of latitude.
This is the fact. We know too little of the operations of nature in the physical world, to assign causes with any degree of confidence. Willing always, however, to guess at what we do not know, I have sometimes indulged myself with conjectures on the causes of the phenomena above stated. I will hazard them on paper, for your amusement, premising for their foundation some principles believed to be true.
Air resting on a heated and reflecting surface, becomes warmer, rarer, and lighter: it ascends therefore, and the circumjacent air, which is colder and heavier, flows into its place, becomes warmed and lightened in its turn, ascends, and is succeeded as that which went before. If the heated surface be circular, the air flows to it from every quarter, like the rays of a circle to its centre. If it be a zone of determinate breadth and indefinite length, the air will flow from each side perpendicularly on it. If the currents of air flowing from opposite sides, be of equal force, they will meet in equilibrio, at a line drawn longitudinally through the middle of the zone. If one current be stronger than the other, the stronger one will force back the line of equilibrium, towards the further edge of the zone, or even beyond it: the motion it has acquired causing it to overshoot the zone, as the motion acquired by a pendulum in its descent, causes it to vibrate beyond the point of its lowest descent.
Earth, exposed naked to the sun’s rays, absorbs a good portion of them; but, being an opaque body, those rays penetrate to a small depth only. Its surface, by this accumulation of absorbed rays, becomes considerably heated. The residue of the rays are reflected into the air resting on that surface. This air, then, is warmed, 1. by the direct rays of the sun; 2. by its reflected rays; 3. by contact with the heated surface. A forest receiving the sun’s rays, a part of them enters the intervals between the trees, and their reflection upwards is intercepted by the leaves and boughs. The rest fall on the trees, the leaves of which being generally inclined towards the horizon, reflect the rays downwards. The atmosphere here, then, receives little or no heat by reflection. Again, these leaves having a power of keeping themselves cool by their own transpiration, they impart no heat to the air by contact. Reflection and contact, then, two of the three modes before-mentioned, of communicating heat, are wanting here; and, of course, the air over a country covered by forest must be colder than that over cultivated grounds.
The sea being pellucid, the sun’s rays penetrate it to a considerable depth. Being also fluid, and in perpetual agitation, its parts are constantly mixed together; so that instead of its heat being all accumulated in its surface, as in the case of a solid, opaque body, it is diffused through its whole mass. Its surface, therefore, is comparatively cool, for these reasons; to which may be added that of evaporation. The small degree of reflection which might otherwise take place, is generally prevented by the rippled state of its surface. The air resting on the sea, then, like that resting on a forest, receives little or no heat by reflection or contact; and is therefore colder than that which lies over a cultivated country.
To apply these observations to the phenomena under consideration. The first settlements of Virginia were made along the sea coast, bearing from the south, towards the north, a little eastwardly. These settlements formed a zone, in which, though every point was not cleared of its forest, yet a good proportion was cleared and cultivated. The cultivated earth, as the sun advances above the horizon in the morning, acquires from it an intense heat, which is retained and increased through the warm parts of the day. The air resting on it becomes warm in proportion, and rises. On one side is a country still covered with forest: on the other is the ocean. The colder air from both of these, then rushes towards the heated zone, to supply the place left vacant there by the ascent of its warm air. The breeze from the west is light and feeble; because it traverses a country covered with mountains and forests, which retard its current. That from the east is strong; as passing over the ocean, wherein there is no obstacle to its motion. It is probable, therefore, that this easterly breeze forces itself far into, or perhaps beyond, the zone which produces it. This zone is, by the increase of population, continually widening into the interior country. The line of equilibrium between the easterly and westerly breezes is, therefore, progressive.
Did no foreign causes intervene, the sea breezes would be a little southwardly of the east, that direction being perpendicular to our coast. But within the tropics, there are winds which blow continually and strongly from the east. This current affects the course of the air, even without the tropics. The same cause, too, which produces a strong motion of the air, from east to west, between the tropics, to wit, the sun, exercises its influence without those limits, but more feebly, in proportion as the surface of the globe is there more obliquely presented to its rays. This effect, though not great, is not to be neglected when the sun is in or near our summer solstice, which is the season of these easterly breezes. The northern air, too, flowing towards the equatorial parts, to supply the vacuum made there by the ascent of their heated air, has only the small rotary motion of the polar latitudes from which it comes. Nor does it suddenly acquire the swifter rotation of the parts into which it enters. This gives it the effect of a motion opposed to that of the earth, that is to say, of an easterly one. And all these causes together are known to produce currents of air in the Atlantic, varying from east to northeast, as far as the fortieth degree of latitude. It is this current which presses our sea breeze out of its natural southeasterly direction, to an easterly, and sometimes almost a northeasterly one.
We are led naturally to ask, where the progress of our sea breezes will ultimately be stopped? No confidence can be placed in any answer to this question. If they should ever pass the mountainous country which separates the waters of the ocean from those of the Mississippi, there may be circumstances which might aid their further progress, as far as the Mississippi. That mountainous country commences about two hundred miles from the sea coast, and consists of successive ranges passing from northeast to southwest, and rising the one above the other to the Allegany Ridge, which is the highest of all. From that, lower and lower ridges succeed one another again, till having covered, in the whole, a breadth of two hundred miles from southeast to northwest, they subside into a plain, fertile country, extending four hundred miles to the Mississippi, and probably much further on the other side, towards the heads of the western waters. When this country shall become cultivated, it will, for the reasons before explained, draw to it winds from the east and west. In this case, should the sea breezes pass the intermediate mountains, they will rather be aided than opposed in their further progress to the Mississippi. There are circumstances, however, which render it possible that they may not be able to pass those intermediate mountains. 1. These mountains constitute the highest lands within the United States. The air on them must consequently be very cold and heavy, and have a tendency to flow both to the east and west. 2. Ranging across the current of the sea breezes, they are in themselves, so many successive barriers opposed to their progress. 3. The country they occupy is covered with trees, which assist to weaken and spend the force of the breezes. 4. It will remain so covered; a very small proportion of it being capable of culture. 5. The temperature of its air, then, will never be softened by culture.
Whether in the plain country between the Mississippi and Allegany mountains, easterly or westerly winds prevail at present, I am not informed. I conjecture, however, that they must be westerly: and I think with you, Sir, that if those mountains were to subside into plain country, as their opposition to the westerly winds would then be removed, they would repress more powerfully those from the east, and of course would remove the line of equilibrium nearer to the sea coast for the present.
Having had occasion to mention the course of the tropical winds from east to west, I will add some observations connected with them. They are known to occasion a strong current in the ocean, in the same direction. This current breaks on that wedge of land of which Saint Roque is the point; the southern column of it probably turning off and washing the coast of Brazil. I say probably, because I have never heard the fact, and conjecture it from reason only. The northern column, having its western motion diverted towards the north, and reinforced by the currents of the great rivers Orinoko, Amazons, and Tocantin, has probably been the agent which formed the Gulf of Mexico, cutting the American continent nearly in two, in that part. It re-issues into the ocean at the northern end of the Gulf, and passes by the name of the Gulf Stream, all along the coast of the United States, to its northern extremity. There it turns off eastwardly, having formed by its eddy, at this turn, the Banks of Newfoundland. Through the whole of its course, from the Gulf to the Banks, it retains a very sensible warmth. The Spaniards are, at this time, desirous of trading to their Philippine Islands, by the way of the Cape of Good Hope: but opposed in it by the Dutch, under authority of the treaty of Munster, they are examining the practicability of a common passage through the Straits of Magellan, or round Cape Horn. Were they to make an opening through the Isthmus of Panama, a work much less difficult than some even of the inferior canals of France, however small this opening should be in the beginning, the tropical current entering it with all its force, would soon widen it sufficiently for its own passage, and thus complete in a short time, that work which otherwise will still employ it for ages. Less country, too, would be destroyed by it in this way. These consequences would follow. 1. Vessels from Europe or the western coast of Africa, by entering the tropics, would have a steady wind and tide to carry them through the Atlantic, through America and the Pacific ocean, to every part of the Asiatic coast, and of the eastern coast of Africa: thus performing with speed and safety the tour of the whole globe, to within about twenty-four degrees of longitude, or one fifteenth part of its circumference; the African continent, under the line, occupying about that space. 2. The Gulf of Mexico, now the most dangerous navigation in the world on account of its currents and moveable sands, would become stagnant and safe. 3. The Gulf Stream on the coast of the United States would cease, and with that, those derangements of course and reckoning, which now impede and endanger the intercourse with those States. 4. The fogs on the Banks of Newfoundland,* supposed to be the vapors of the Gulf Stream rendered turbid by cold air, would disappear. 5. Those Banks ceasing to receive supplies of sand, weeds, and warm water, by the Gulf Stream, it might become problematical what effect changes of pasture and temperatures would have on the fisheries. However it is time to relieve you from this long lecture. I wish its subject may have been sufficiently interesting to make amends for its details. These are submitted with entire deference to your better judgment. I will only add to them, by assuring you of the sentiments of perfect esteem and respect, with which I have the honor to be, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
TO GENERAL WASHINGTON.
Paris, November 14, 1786.
Sir,
The house of Le Coulteux, which for some centuries has been the wealthiest of this place, has it in contemplation to establish a great company for the fur trade. They propose that partners interested one half in the establishment, should be American citizens, born and residing in the United States. Yet if I understood them rightly, they expect that the half of the company which resides here, should make the greatest part, or perhaps the whole of the advances, while those on our side the water should superintend the details. They had, at first, thought of Baltimore as the centre of their American transactions. I have pointed out to them the advantages of Alexandria for this purpose. They have concluded to take information as to Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York, for a principal deposit, and having no correspondent at Alexandria, have asked me to procure a state of the advantages of that place, as also to get a recommendation of the best merchant there, to be adopted as partner and head of the business there. Skill, punctuality, and integrity are the requisites in such a character. They will decide on their whole information, as to the place for their principal factory. Being unwilling that Alexandria should lose its pretensions, I have undertaken to procure them information as to that place. If they undertake this trade at all, it will be on so great a scale as to decide the current of the Indian-trade to the place they adopt. I have no acquaintance at Alexandria or in its neighborhood; but believing you would feel an interest in the matter, from the same motives which I do, I venture to ask the favor of you to recommend to me a proper merchant for their purpose, and to engage some well informed person to send me a representation of the advantages of Alexandria, as the principal deposit of the fur trade.
The author of the political part of the Encyclopédie Méthodique desired me to examine his article, Etats Unis. I did so. I found it a tissue of errors; for in truth they know nothing about us here. Particularly, however, the article Cincinnati was a mere philippic against that institution: in which it appeared that there was an utter ignorance of facts and motives. I gave him notes on it. He reformed it, as he supposed, and sent it again to me to revise. In this reformed state, Colonel Humphreys saw it.
I found it necessary to write that article for him. Before I gave it to him, I showed it to the Marquis de la Fayette, who made a correction or two. I then sent it to the author. He used the materials, mixing a great deal of his own with them. In a work which is sure of going down to the latest posterity, I thought it material to set facts to rights, as much as possible. The author was well disposed; but could not entirely get the better of his original bias. I send you the article as ultimately published. If you find any material errors in it, and will be so good as to inform me of them, I shall probably have opportunities of setting this author to rights. What has heretofore passed between us on this institution, makes it my duty to mention to you, that I have never heard a person in Europe, learned or unlearned, express his thoughts on this institution, who did not consider it as dishonorable and destructive to our governments; and that every writing which has come out since my arrival here, in which it is mentioned, considers it, even as now reformed, as the germ whose developement is one day to destroy the fabric we have reared. I did not apprehend this, while I had American ideas only. But I confess that what I have seen in Europe, has brought me over to that opinion; and that though the day may be at some distance, beyond the reach of our lives perhaps, yet it will certainly come, when a single fibre left of this institution will produce an hereditary aristocracy, which will change the form of our governments from the best to the worst in the world. To know the mass of evil which flows from this fatal source, a person must be in France; he must see the finest soil, the finest climate, the most compact state, the most benevolent character of people, and every earthly advantage combined, insufficient to prevent this scourge from rendering existence a curse to twenty-four out of twenty-five parts of the inhabitants of this country. With us, the branches of this institution cover all the states. The southern ones, at this time, are aristocratical in their dispositions: and that that spirit should grow and extend itself, is within the natural order of things. I do not flatter myself with the immortality of our governments: but I shall think little also of their longevity, unless this germ of destruction be taken out. When the society themselves shall weigh the possibility of evil, against the impossibility of any good to proceed from this institution, I cannot help hoping they will eradicate it. I know they wish the permanence of our governments, as much as any individuals composing them.
An interruption here, and the departure of the gentleman by whom I send this, oblige me to conclude it with assurances of the sincere respect and esteem, with which I have the honor to be, Dear Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
TO JAMES MADISON.
Paris, December 16, 1786.
Dear Sir,
After a very long silence, I am at length able to write to you. An unlucky dislocation of my right wrist has disabled me from using that hand, three months. I now begin to use it a little, but with great pain; so that this letter must be taken up at such intervals as the state of my hand will permit, and will probably be the work of some days. Though the joint seems to be well set, the swelling does not abate, nor the use of it return. I am now, therefore, on the point of setting out, to the south of France, to try the use of some mineral waters there, by immersion. This journey will be of two or three months.
I enclose you herein a copy of the letter from the minister of finance to me, making several advantageous regulations for our commerce. The obtaining this has occupied us a twelvemonth. I say us, because I find the Marquis de la Fayette so useful an auxiliary, that acknowledgements for his co-operation are always due. There remains still something to do for the articles of rice, turpentine, and ship duties. What can be done for tobacco when the late regulation expires, is very uncertain. The commerce between the United States and this country being put on a good footing, we may afterwards proceed to try if any thing can be done to favor our intercourse with her colonies. Admission into them for our fish and flour, is very desirable: but, unfortunately, both those articles would raise a competition against their own.
I find by the public papers, that your commercial convention failed in point of representation. If it should produce a full meeting in May, and a broader reformation, it will still be well. To make us one nation as to foreign concerns, and keep us distinct in domestic ones, gives the outline of the proper division of powers between the general and particular governments. But to enable the federal head to exercise the powers given it, to best advantage, it should be organized, as the particular ones are, into legislative, executive, and judiciary. The first and last are already separated. The second should be. When last with Congress, I often proposed to members to do this, by making of the committee of the States an executive committee during the recess of Congress, and during its sessions to appoint a committee to receive and despatch all executive business, so that Congress itself should meddle only with what should be legislative. But I question if any Congress (much less all successively) can have self-denial enough to go, through with this distribution. The distribution, then, should be imposed on them. I find Congress have reversed their division of the western States, and proposed to make them fewer and larger. This is reversing the natural order of things. A tractable people may be governed in large bodies: but in proportion as they depart from this character, the extent of their government must be less. We see into what small divisions the Indians are obliged to reduce their societies. This measure, with the disposition to shut up the Mississippi, gives me serious apprehensions of the severance of the eastern and western parts of our confederacy. It might have been made the interest of the western States to remain united with us, by managing their interests honestly, and for their own good. But the moment we sacrifice their interests to our own, they will see it better to govern themselves. The moment they resolve to do this, the point is settled. A forced connection is neither our interest, nor within our power. The Virginia act for religious freedom has been received with infinite approbation in Europe, and propagated with enthusiasm. I do not mean by the governments, but by the individuals who compose them. It has been translated into French and Italian, has been sent to most of the courts of Europe, and has been the best evidence of the falsehood of those reports, which stated us to be in anarchy. It is inserted in the new Encyclopédie, and is appearing in most of the publications respecting America. In fact, it is comfortable to see the standard of reason at length erected, after so many ages, during which the human mind has been held in vassalage by kings, priests, and nobles: and it is honorable for us to have produced the first legislature who had the courage to declare, that the reason of man may be trusted with the formation of his own opinions.
I thank you for your communications in Natural History. The several instances of trees, &c. found far below the surface of the earth, as in the case of Mr. Hay’s well, seem to set the reason of man at defiance.
I am, Dear Sir, with sincere esteem, your friend and servant,
Th: Jefferson.
TO CHARLES THOMSON.
Paris, December 17,1780.
Dear Sir,
A dislocation of my right wrist has for three months past disabled me from writing, except with my left hand, which was too slow and awkward to be employed often. I begin to have so much use of my wrist as to be able to write, but it is slowly, and in pain. I take the first moment I can, however, to acknowledge the receipt of your letters of April the 6th, July the 8th and 30th. In one of these, you say you have not been able to learn, whether, in the new mills in London, steam is the immediate mover of the machinery, or raises water to move it. It is the immediate mover. The power of this agent, though long known, is but now beginning to be applied to the various purposes of which it is susceptible. You observe, that Whitehurst supposes it to have been the agent, which bursting the earth, threw it up into mountains and vallies. You ask me what I think of this book. I find in it many interesting facts brought together, and many ingenious commentaries on them. But there are great chasms in his facts, and consequently in his reasoning, These he fills up by suppositions, which may be as reasonably denied as granted. A sceptical reader, therefore, like myself, is left in the lurch. I acknowledge, however, he makes more use of fact, than any other writer on a theory of the earth. But I give one answer to all these theorists. That is as follows. They all suppose the earth a created existence. They must suppose a creator then; and that he possessed power and wisdom to a great degree. As he intended the earth for the habitation of animals and vegetables, is it reasonable to suppose, he made two jobs of his creation, that he first made a chaotic lump, and set it into rotatory motion, and then waited the millions of ages necessary to form itself? That when it had done this, he stepped in a second time, to create the animals and plants which were to inhabit it? As the hand of a creator is to be called in, it may as well be called in at one stage of the process as another. We may as well suppose he created the earth at once, nearly in the state in which we see it, fit for the preservation of the beings he placed on it. But it is said, we have a proof that he did not create it in its present solid form, but in a state of fluidity: because its present shape of an oblate spheroid is precisely that, which a fluid mass revolving on its axis would assume.
I suppose, that the same equilibrium between gravity and centrifugal force, which would determine a fluid mass into the form of an oblate spheroid, would determine the wise creator of that mass, if he made it in a solid state, to give it the same spheroidical form. A revolving fluid will continue to change its shape, till it attains that in which its principles of contrary motion are balanced. For if you suppose them not balanced, it will change its form. Now the same balanced form is necessary for the preservation of a revolving solid. The creator, therefore, of a revolving solid, would make it an oblate spheroid, that figure alone admitting a perfect equilibrium. He would make it in that form, for another reason; that is, to prevent a shifting of the axis of rotation. Had he created the earth perfectly spherical, its axis might have been perpetually shifting, by the influence of the other bodies of the system; and by placing the inhabitants of the earth successively under its poles, it might have been depopulated; whereas, being spheroidical, it has but one axis on which it can revolve in equilibrio. Suppose the axis of the earth to shift forty-five degrees; then cut it into one hundred and eighty slices, making every section in the plane of a circle of latitude, perpendicular to the axis: every one of these slices, except the equatorial one, would be unbalanced, as there would be more matter on one side of its axis than on the other. There could be but one diameter drawn through such a slice, which would divide it into two equal parts. On every other possible diameter, the parts would hang unequal. This would produce an irregularity in the diurnal rotation. We may, therefore, conclude it impossible for the poles of the earth to shift, if it was made spheroidical; and that it would be made spheroidical, though solid, to obtain this end. I use this reasoning only on the supposition, that the earth has had a beginning. I am sure I shall read your conjectures on this subject with great pleasure, though I bespeak beforehand, a right to indulge my natural incredulity and scepticism. The pain in which I write, awakens me here from my reverie, and obliges me to conclude with compliments to Mrs. Thomson, and assurances to yourself of the esteem and affection with which I am sincerely, Dear Sir, your friend and servant,
Th: Jefferson.
P. S. Since writing the preceding, I have had a conversation on the subject of the steam-mills, with the famous Boulton, to whom those of London belong, and who is here at this time. He compares the effect of steam with that of horses, in the following manner. Six horses, aided with the most advantageous combination of the mechanical powers hitherto tried, will grind six bushels of flour in an hour; at the end of which time they are all in a foam, and must rest. They can work thus six hours in the twenty-four, grinding thirty-six bushels of flour, which is six to each horse, for the twenty-four hours. His steam-mill in London consumes one hundred and twenty bushels of coal in twenty-four hours, turns ten pair of stones, which grind eight bushels of flour an hour each, which is nineteen hundred and twenty bushels in the twenty-four hours. This makes a peck and a half of coal perform exactly as much as a horse in one day can perform.
TO COLONEL MONROE.
Paris, December 18, 1786.
Dear Sir,
Your letters of August the 19th and October the 12th have come duly to hand. My last to you was of the 11th of August. Soon after that date I got my right wrist dislocated, which has till now deprived me of the use of that hand; and even now I can use it but slowly, and with pain. The revisal of the Congressional intelligence contained in your letters, makes me regret the loss of it on your departure. I feel, too, the want of a person there to whose discretion I can trust confidential communications, and on whose friendship I can rely against the unjust designs of malevolence. I have no reason to suppose I have enemies in Congress; yet it is too possible, to be without that fear. Some symptoms make me suspect, that my proceedings to redress the abusive administration of tobacco by the Farmers General have indisposed towards me a powerful person in Philadelphia, who was profiting from that abuse. An expression in the enclosed letter of M. de Calonne, would seem to imply, that I had asked the abolition of Mr. Morris’s contract. I never did. On the contrary, I always observed to them, that it would be unjust to annul that contract. I was led to this, by principles both of justice and interest. Of interest, because that contract would keep up the price of tobacco here to thirty-four, thirty-six, and thirty-eight livres, from which it will fall when it shall no longer have that support. However, I have done what was right, and I will not so far wound my privilege of doing that, without regard to any man’s interest, as to enter into any explanations of this paragraph with him. Yet I esteem him highly, and suppose that hitherto he had esteemed me. You will see by Calonne’s letter, that we are doing what we can to get the trade of the United States put on a good footing. I am now about setting out on a journey to the south of France, one object of which is to try the mineral waters there for the restoration of my hand; but another is, to visit all the seaports where we have trade, and to hunt up all the inconveniences under which it labors, in order to get them rectified. I shall visit, and carefully examine too, the canal of Languedoc. On my return, which will be early in the spring, I shall send you several livraisons of the Encyclopédie, and the plan of your house. I wish to Heaven, you may continue in the disposition to fix it in Albemarle. Short will establish himself there, and perhaps Madison may be tempted to do so. This will be society enough, and it will be the great sweetener of our lives. Without society, and a society to our taste, men are never contented. The one here supposed, we can regulate to our minds, and we may extend our regulations to the sumptuary department, so as to set a good example to a country which needs it, and to preserve our own happiness clear of embarrassment. You wish not to engage in the drudgery of the bar. You have two asylums from that. Either to accept a seat in the Council, or in the judiciary department. The latter, however, would require a little previous drudgery at the bar, to qualify you to discharge your duty with satisfaction to yourself. Neither of these would be inconsistent with a continued residence in Albemarle. It is but twelve hours drive in a sulky from Charlottesville to Richmond, keeping a fresh horse always at the half-way, which would be a small annual expense. I am in hopes, that Mrs. M. will have in her domestic cares occupation and pleasure sufficient to fill her time, and insure her against the tedium vitæ: that she will find, that the distractions of a town, and the waste of life under these, can bear no comparison with the tranquil happiness of domestic life. If her own experience has not yet taught her this truth, she has in its favor the testimony of one, who has gone through the various scenes of business, of bustle, of office, of rambling, and of quiet retirement, and who can assure her, that the latter is the only point upon which the mind can settle at rest. Though not clear of inquietudes, because no earthly situation is so, they are fewer in number, and mixed with more objects of contentment, than in any other mode of life. But I must not philosophize too much with her, lest I give her too serious apprehensions of a friendship I shall impose on her. I am with very great esteem, Dear Sir, your sincere friend and servant,
Th: Jefferson.
TO MR. CARMICHAEL.
Paris, December 26,1786.
Dear Sir,
A note from me of the 22nd of September apprized you it would be some time before I should be able to answer your letters. I did not then expect it would have been so long.
I enclose herein a resolution of Congress recalling Mr. Lambe, which I will beg the favor of you to have delivered him. I have written to Mr. Adams on the subject of directing him to settle with Mr. Barclay, and attend his answer. In the mean time, I am not without hopes Mr. Barclay has done the business. I send also a note desiring Mr. Lambe to deliver you his cipher: and a copy of a letter from the minister of finance here to me, announcing several regulations in favor of our commerce.
My Notes on Virginia, having been hastily written, need abundance of corrections. Two or three of these are so material, that I am reprinting a few leaves to substitute for the old. As soon as these shall be ready, I will beg your acceptance of a copy. I shall be proud to be permitted to send a copy also to the Count de Campomanes, as a tribute to his science and his virtues. You will find in them, that the Natural Bridge has found an admirer in me also. I should be happy to make with you the tour of the curiosities you will find therein mentioned. That kind of pleasure surpasses much, in my estimation, whatever I find on this side the Atlantic. I sometimes think of building a little hermitage at the Natural Bridge (for it is my property), and of passing there a part of the year at least.
I have received American papers to the 1st of November. Some tumultuous meetings of the people have taken place in the eastern States; i.e. one in Massachusetts, one in Connecticut, and one in New Hampshire. Their principal demand was a respite in the judiciary proceedings. No injury was done, however, in a single instance, to the person or property of any one, nor did the tumult continue twenty-four hours in any one instance. In Massachusetts this was owing to the discretion which the malcontents still preserved; in Connecticut and New Hampshire the body of the people rose in support of government, and obliged the malcontents to go to their homes. In the last mentioned State they seized about forty, who were in jail for trial. It is believed this incident will strengthen our government. Those people are not entirely without excuse. Before the war these States depended on their whale-oil and fish. The former was consumed in England, and much of the latter in the Mediterranean. The heavy duties on American whale-oil, now required in England, exclude it from that market: and the Algerines exclude them from bringing their fish into the Mediterranean. France is opening her ports for their oil, but in the mean while their ancient debts are pressing them, and they have nothing to pay with. The Massachusetts Assembly, too, in their zeal for paying their public debt, had laid a tax too heavy to be paid, in the circumstances of their State. The Indians seem disposed, too, to make war on us. These complicated causes determined Congress to increase their forces to two thousand men. The latter was the sole object avowed, yet the former entered for something into the measure. However, I am satisfied the good sense of the people is the strongest army our governments can ever have, and that it will not fail them. The commercial convention at Annapolis was not full enough to do business. They found, too, their appointments too narrow, being confined to the article of commerce. They have proposed a meeting at Philadelphia in May, and that it may be authorized to propose amendments of whatever is defective in the federal constitution.
When I was in England, I formed a portable copying press, on the principles of the large one they make there, for copying letters. I had a model made there, and it has answered perfectly. A workman here has made several from that model. The itinerant temper of your court will, I think, render one of these useful to you. You must, therefore, do me the favor to accept of one. I have it now in readiness, and shall send it by the way of Bayonne, to the care of Mr. Alexander there, unless Don Miguel de Lardi-zabal can carry it with him.
My hand admonishes me it is time to stop, and that I must defer writing to Mr. Barclay till to-morrow.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the highest esteem and respect,
Dear Sir, your most obedient
and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
TO MR. VAUGHAN.
Paris, December 29, 1786.
Sir,
When I had the honor of seeing you in London, you were so kind as to permit me to trouble you, sometimes with my letters, and particularly on the subject of mathematical or philosophical instruments. Such a correspondence will be too agreeable to me, and at the same time too useful, not to avail myself of your permission. It has been an opinion pretty generally received among philosophers, that the atmosphere of America is more humid than that of Europe. Monsieur de Buffon makes this hypothesis one of the two pillars whereon he builds his system of the degeneracy of animals in America. Having had occasion to controvert this opinion of his, as to the degeneracy of animals there, I expressed a doubt of the fact assumed, that our climates are more moist. I did not know of any experiments, which might authorize a denial of it. Speaking afterwards on the subject with Dr. Franklin, he mentioned to me the observations he had made on a case of magnets, made for him by Mr. Nairne in London. Of these you will see a detail in the second volume of the American Philosophical Transactions, in a letter from Dr. Franklin to Mr. Nairne, wherein he recommends to him to take up the principle therein explained, and endeavor to make an hygrometer, which, taking slowly the temperature of the atmosphere, shall give its mean degree of moisture, and enable us thus to make with more certainty a comparison between the humidities of different climates. May I presume to trouble you with an inquiry of Mr. Nairne, whether he has executed the Doctor’s idea; and if he has, to get him to make for me a couple of the instruments he may have contrived. They should be made of the same piece, and under like circumstances, that sending one to America, I may rely on its indications there, compared with those of the one I shall retain here. Being in want of a set of magnets also, I would be glad if he would at the same time send me a set, the case of which should be made as Dr. Franklin describes his to have been, so that I may repeat his experiment. Colonel Smith will do me the favor to receive these things from Mr. Nairne, and to pay him for them.
I think Mr. Rittenhouse never published an invention of his in this way, which was a very good one. It was of an hygrometer, which, like the common ones, was to give the actual moisture of the air. He has two slips of mahogany about five inches long, three fourths of an inch broad, and one tenth of an inch thick, the one having the grain running lengthwise, and the other crosswise. These are glued together by their faces, so as to form a piece five inches long, three fourths of an inch broad, and one third of an inch thick, which is stuck by its lower end into a little plinth of wood, presenting their edge to the view. The fibres of the wood you know are dilated, but not lengthened by moisture. The slip, therefore, whose grain is lengthwise, becomes a standard, retaining always the same precise length. That which has its grain crosswise, dilates with moisture, and contracts for the want of it. If the right hand piece be the cross-grained one, when the air is very moist, it lengthens, and forces its companion to form a kind of interior annulus of a circle on the left. When the air is dry, it contracts, draws its companion to the right, and becomes itself the interior annulus. In order to show this dilation and contraction, an index is fixed on the upper end of the two slips; a plate of metal or wood is fastened to the front of the plinth, so as to cover the two slips from the eye. A slit, being nearly the portion of a circle, is cut in this plate, so that the shank of the index may play freely through its whole range. On the edge of the slit is a graduation. The objection to this instrument is, that it is not fit for comparative observations, because no two pieces of wood being of the same texture exactly, no two will yield exactly alike to the same agent. However, it is less objectionable on this account, than most of the substances used. Mr. Rittenhouse had a thought of trying ivory: but I do not know whether he executed it. All these substances not only vary from one another at the same time, but from themselves at different times. All of them, however, have some peculiar advantages, and I think this, on the whole, appeared preferable to any other I had ever seen. Not knowing whether you had heard of this instrument, and supposing it would amuse you, I have taken the liberty of detailing it to you.
I beg you to be assured of the sentiments of perfect esteem and respect with which I have the honor to be, Sir, your most obedient
and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.