University of Virginia Library

TO MARQUIS DE LA FAYETTE.

My Dear Friend, Your favor of Ocr. 27 has been
some time on hand, tho' it met with delays, after
it got into port. My health in which you take so
kind an interest was as reported interrupted by a
severe, tho' short attack, but is now very good.
I hope yours is so without having suffered any
interruption.

I wish I could give you fuller & better accounts of
the Monticello affairs. Neither Virginia, nor any
other State has added to the provision made for
Mrs. Randolph by S. Carolina & Louisiana; and the
Lottery, owing to several causes, has entirely failed.
The property sold, consisting of all the Items except
the lands & a few pictures & other ornaments, was
fortunate in the prices obtained. I know not the
exact amount. But a balance of debt remains, which
I fear, in the sunken value and present unsalableness
of landed property, will require for its discharge a
more successful use of the manuscripts proper for
the Press, than is likely to be soon effected. A
prospectus has been lately published by Mr. Jefferson
Randolph, extending to 3 or 4 8° vols., and considerable
progress is made, I understand, in selecting (a
very delicate task) and transcribing (a tedious one)
the materials for the Edition. In this country also,
subscriptions in the extent hoped for, will require
time, and arrangements are yet to be made for
cotemporary publications in England & France, in
both of which they are as they ought to be contemplated.

I have apprized Mr. Randolph of your
friendly dispositions with respect to a French Edition
&c, for which he is very thankful, and means to
profit by. From this view of the matter, we can
only flatter ourselves that the result, will be earlier,
than the promise, and prove adequate to the occasion.
If the difficulties in the way of the enlarged plan of
publication can be overcome, and the work have a sale
corresponding with its intrinsic merits, it cannot fail
to be very productive. A memoir making a part
of it will be particularly attractive in France, portraying
as it does the Revolutionary scenes, whilst
Mr. Jefferson was in Paris. Is there not some danger
that a censorship, may shut the press against such a
publication? I fear the translator will be obliged
to skip over parts at least, and those perhaps among
the most interesting.

Mrs. M. has just recd. a letter from Mrs. Randolph,
in which she manifests a fixed purpose of returning
to Virginia, in the month of May. Her health has
been essentially improved since she left it.

I was aware, when I saw the printed letter of Mr.
Jefferson in whch. he animadverts on licentious
printers, that if seen in Europe, it would receive the
misconstruction, or rather perversion to which you
allude. Certain it is that no man more than
Mr. Jefferson, regarded the freedom of the press,
as an essential safeguard to free Govt., to which no
man cd. be more devoted than he was, and that he
never could therefore have expressed a syllable or
entertained a thought unfriendly to it.

I have not supposed it worth while to notice at
so late a day the misprint in the "Enquirer" to
which you refer, because I take for granted that a
correct expression of what you said on the 4th of
July, will be preserved in depositories more likely to
be resorted to than a Newspaper.

We learn with much gratification that the Greeks
are rescued from the actual atrocities suffered, & the
horrible doom threatened from the successes of their
savage Enemy. The disposition to be made of them
by the mediating Powers is a problem full of anxiety.
We hope for the best, after their escape from the
worst. We are particularly gratified also by the turn
given to the elections in France, so little expected
at the date of your letter, and which must give some
scope for your patriotic exertions. If the event does
not mean all that we wish it to do, it marks a progress
of the public sentiment in a good direction. Your
speech on the tomb of Manuel is well calculated to
nourish & stimulate it.

I well knew the painful feelings with which you
would observe the extravagances produced by the
Presidential contest. They have found their way
into the discussions of Congress & the State Legislatures,
and have assumed forms that cannot be too
much deplored. It happens too unfortunately, that
the questions of Tariff & of Roads & Canals, which
divide the public, on the grounds both of the Constn.
& of justice, come on at the same time, are blended
with & greatly increase the flame kindled by the
Electioneering zeal. In Georgia fuel was derived

from a further source, a discontent at the tardy
removal of the Indians from lands within her State
limits. Resolutions of both Georgia & S. Carolina
have been passed & published which abroad may
be regarded as striking at the Union itself, but they
are ebullitions of the moment, and so regarded here.
I am sorry that Virginia has caught too much of
the prevailing fever. I think that with her at least
its symptoms are abating.

Your answer to Mr. Clay was included in the
voluminous testimony published by him, in repelling
charges made agst. him. Your recollections could
not fail to be of avail to him, and were so happily
stated as to give umbrage to no party.

In the zeal of party, a large & highly respectable
meeting at Richmond, in recommending Presidential
Electors, were led by a misjudging policy to put on
their ticket the names of Mr. Monroe & myself, not
only without our sanction, but on sufficient presumptions
that they would be withdrawn. In my answer
to that effect, I have ventured to throw in a dehortation
from the violent manner in which the contest is
carried on. How it may be relished by the parties
I know not.[99]

You sympathize too much with a Country that
continues its affection for you, without abatement,
not to be anxious to know the probable result, as
well as the present state of the ardent Contest. I
can only say that the Party for Genl. Jackson are
quite confident, and that for Mr. Adams, apparently
with but faint hopes. Whether any change, for
which there is time, will take place in the prospect,
cannot be foreseen. A good deal will depend on
the vote of N. York, and I see by the Newspapers
that the sudden death of Mr. Clinton is producing in
both parties rival appeals thro' obituary Eulogies, to
the portion of the people particularly attached to him.

Miss F. Wright has just returned in good health, via
N. Orleans, to her Establishment in Tennessee, and

has announced a change in the plan of it, probably
not unknown to you. With her rare talents &
still rarer disinterestedness she has I fear created
insuperable obstacles to the good fruits of which
they might be productive by her disregard or rather
defiance of the most established opinion & vivid
feelings. Besides her views of amalgamating the
white & black population so universally obnoxious,
she gives an eclât to her notions on the subject of
Religion & of marriage, the effect of which your
knowledge of this Country can readily estimate.
Her sister in her absence had exchanged her celibacy
for the state of wedlock, with what companion I am
not informed, nor whether with the new or old ideas
of the conjugal knot.

Our University is doing, tho' not as well as we cd.
wish, as well as could be reasonably expected. An
early laxity of discipline, had occasioned irregularities
in the habits of the students which were rendering
the Institution unpopular. To this evil an effectual
remedy has been applied. The studious & moral
conduct of the young men will now bear a comparison
with the best examples in the U. S. But we have
been unfortunate in losing a Professor of Mathematics,
who was a valuable acquisition, and are soon to
lose the Professor of Ancient Languages, whose distinguished
Competency we can scarcely hope to
replace. Both of them were from England, &
tho' professing to be friendly to this Country, and
doing well in their respective stations, preferred a
return to their native home; one of them seduced

by an appointment in the new University in London;
and the other, it is supposed, by the hope of obtaining
an appointment. But the great cause which retards
the growth of the Institution, is the pecuniary
distress of the State, the effect of scanty crops &
reduced prices, with habits of expence the effect of a
better state of things. The mass of our people as
you know, consists of those who depend on their
Agricultural resources, and the failure of these,
leaves it in the power of but few parents, to give the
desired education to their sons, cheap as it has
been made to them. We cherish the hope of a
favorable change, but the immediate prospect is
not flattering.

My mother, little changed since you saw her recd.
with much sensibility your kind remembrance, and
charges me with the due returns. Mrs. M. joins me
in assurances of every good wish for yourself, your
son, and the whole household, with an extension to
Mr. Le Vasseur. Most affectionately yrs.