republican government, that the will of the majority must prevail. Nor is it seen how any course could have been taken that would not have pressed sorely on the navigating states, as was afterwards proved by the fact that their sufferings and their discontents continued undiminished through all the changes that afterwards took place, until the peace in Europe restored to them freedom and safety on the ocean.

It was in the same orthodox zeal for republicanism that Mr. Jefferson abolished those courtly forms and ceremonies which had been studiously cherished during the previous administrations by the underlings of office. He regarded these fantastic refinements of a semi-barbarous age as indicating the same desire of elevating a few of the community at the expense of the rest, which originated them; or at best a weak and childish taste for trifles altogether unsuited to the simple and manly dignity of republicans; and which, when most successfully exerted here, make us, like the ass emulating the lap-dog, but a bad copy of a worthless original.*

* Mr. Jefferson was not content with the abolition of levees, of speeches to the legislature, and with discountenancing every thing like a court ceremonial, but he wished also to impress on the diplomatic corps at Washington that this feature of his administration was to be in harmony with the simplicity of our institutions; and opportunities soon presented themselves. The Danish minister having called one morning to see him, the president appeared in slippers, and adverting to the fact, spoke of his indifference to forms. The minister having intimated in reply, that they could not well be dispensed with, the president took occasion to relate the following anecdote, which while it seemed to conform to the minister's views, still more furthered his own: Ferdinand of Naples complained one morning to his minister Caraccioli of the irksome duty to which he was subjected of conforming to the ceremonies of the court, and asked if some plan could not be devised for his relief: whereupon Caraccioli endeavoured to show that his master's wishes could not be safely fulfilled, and remarked, "Your majesty must remember that you yourself are but a ceremony."

The same temper gave rise to a collision with the British minister, Mr. Merry, which was made the subject of his correspondence with his own government, and was a fruitful source of gossip about Washington. Mr. and Mrs. Merry having been invited to dine with the president, the latter, when dinner was announced, conducted Mrs. Madison whom he was standing near at the time. For the president to have given any

This administration, in a word, vilified as it has been by those whose power it superseded, and whose views it thwarted, has been appealed to by the unbiassed portion of the succeeding generation as the one in which the country, through the greater part of its course, experienced more public prosperity, and through the whole of it, was administered more according to the republican principles of the constitution than any other.

On the 6th of February, the Legislature of Virginia presented to him the following address,* in testimony of their esteem and approbation:

"Sir,

"The General Assembly of your native state cannot close their session without acknowledging your services in the office which you are just about to lay down, and bidding you a respectful and affectionate farewell.

"We have to thank you for the model of an administration conducted on the purest principles of republicanism; for pomp

other lady the precedence, was deemed so serious an offence that Mr. Merry would never accept another invitation from the president. Mr. Madison made a full representation of the whole affair to Mr. Monroe, that he might give the requisite explanation to the British government, if they should regard it as a studied insult, as the federal papers affected to consider it. Mr. Monroe replied that Mr. Merry had no foundation for the claim of precedence he had asserted, and that in England, Mrs. Monroe was postponed to the lady of an under secretary.

Mr. Jefferson's subsequent conduct was as illustrative of his amiable temper as it accorded with real dignity. As he often had small unceremonious parties to dinner, and it was thought Mr. Merry would make a pleasant addition to them, he inquired through the Swedish chargé whether, if Mr. Merry were invited to take a family dinner with the president, he would accept the invitation. The inquiry being made, and answered in the affirmative, a note was accordingly sent under Mr. Jefferson's own hand. On which Mr. Merry wrote to the Secretary of State, Mr. Madison, to know whether he was invited in his private, or his official character. If in the former, he must await his majesty's permission to accept it: if in the latter, he must first have assurance that he would receive the respect and attention due to his majesty's envoy. A cold dry answer, "giving the question the go-by," was returned by Mr. Madison, and thus ended the ridiculous affair.

* This address is understood to have been written by Mr. Wirt, one of the committee appointed to prepare it. The vote on it in the House of Delegates was, 116 to 24.

and state laid aside; patronage discarded; internal taxes abolished; a host of superfluous officers disbanded; the monarchic maxim that 'a national debt is a national blessing,' renounced, and more than thirty-three millions of our debt discharged; the native right to near one hundred millions of acres of our national domain extinguished; and without the guilt or calamities of conquest, a vast and fertile region added to our country, far more extensive than her original possessions, bringing along with it the Mississippi and the port of Orleans, the trade of the West to the Pacific Ocean, and in the intrinsic value of the land itself, a source of permanent and almost inexhaustible revenue. There are points in your administration which the historian will not fail to seize, to expand, and to teach posterity to dwell upon with delight. Nor will he forget our peace with the civilized world, preserved through a season of uncommon difficulty and trial; the good will cultivated with the unfortunate aborigines of our country, and the civilization humanely extended among them; the lesson taught the inhabitants of the coast of Barbary, that we have the means of chastising their piratical encroachments, and awing them into justice; and that theme, which, above all others, the historic genius will hang upon with rapture, the liberty of speech and the press preserved inviolate, without which genius and science are given to man in vain.

"In the principles on which you have administered the government, we see only the continuation and maturity of the same virtues and abilities which drew upon you in your youth the resentment of Dunmore. From the first brilliant and happy moment of your resistance to foreign tyranny until the present day, we mark with pleasure and with gratitude the same uniform and consistent character-the same warm and devoted attachment to liberty and the Republic, the same Roman love of your country, her rights, her peace, her honour, her prosperity.

"How blessed will be the retirement into which you are about to go! How deservedly blessed will it be! For you carry with you the richest of all rewards, the recollection of a life well spent in the service of your country, and proofs the most deci

sive of the love, the gratitude, the veneration of your country

men.

"That your retirement may be as happy as your life has been virtuous and useful; that our youth may see, in the blissful close of your days, an additional inducement to form themselves on your model, is the devout and earnest prayer of your fellow citizens who compose the General Assembly of Virginia."

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CHAPTER XIII.

Mr. Jefferson returns to Monticello. Friendship between the President and Ex-President. Complimentary Addresses. Schemes of passing his time-how far successful. Pecuniary difficulties, and their cause. His studies. Address from the Legislature of New York. Orders the dismission of a prosecution for a libel against him. Mr. Erskine's arrangement-its disavowal-his letter to the President. Vocabularies of Indian Languages. Letter to the Spanish Minister. To Mr. Gallatin. To Mr. Rodney. Kosciusko. His workshop. To Dr. Jones on Cabinet consultations. His views of Napoleon's successes -on the English Constitution-on British Policy. To J. B. Colvin.

1809-1810.

MR. JEFFERSON waited to witness the inauguration of his successor before he left the seat of government, and sat at the right hand of the president elect, while he delivered his inaugural address.

A day or two before he left Washington, he wrote to Mons. Dupont de Nemours in Paris: "Within a few days I retire to my family, my books, and farms; and having gained the harbour myself, I shall look on my friends still buffeting the storm with anxiety indeed, but not with envy. Never did a prisoner released from his chains, feel such relief as I shall on shaking off the shackles of power. Nature intended me for the tranquil pursuits of science, by rendering them my supreme delight. But the enormities of the times in which I have lived, have