In my letter of last week to Mr. Randolph, I mentioned that I should write every Wednesday to him, yourself, and Polly alternately; and that my letters arriving at Monticello the Saturday, and the answer being sent off on Sunday, I should receive it the day before I should have to write again to the same person, so as that the correspondence with each would be exactly kept up. I hope you will do it on your part. I delivered the fan and note to your friend Mrs. Waters (Miss Rittenhouse that was) she being now married to a Doctor Waters. They live in the house with her father. She complained of the petit format of your letter, and Mrs. Trist of no letter. I inclose you the Magasin des Modes of July. My furni ture is arrived from Paris; but it will be long before I can open the packages, as my house will not be ready to receive them for some weeks. As soon as they are opened the mattresses, etc., shall be sent on. News for Mr. Randolph-the letters from Paris inform that as yet all is safe there. They are emitting great sums of paper money. They rather believe there will be no war between Spain and England; but the letters from London count on a war, and it seems rather probable. A general peace is established in the north of Europe, except between Russia and Turkey. It is expected between them also. Wheat here is a French crown the bushel.

Kiss dear Poll for me. Remember me to Mr. Randolph. I do not know yet how the Edgehill negotiation has terminated. Adieu, my dear.

Yours affectionately,

TH. JEFFERSON.

TO MARIA JEFFERSON.

PHILADELPHIA, Dec. 7, 1790.

MY DEAR POLL: This week I write to you, and if you answer my letter as soon as you receive it, and send it to Colonel Bell at Charlottesville, I shall receive it the day before I write to you again-that will be three weeks hence; and this I shall expect you to do always, so that by the correspondence of Mr. Randolph, your sister, and yourself, I may hear from home once a week. Mr. Randolph's letter from Richmond came to me about five days ago. How do you all do? Tell me that in your letter, also what is going forward with you, how you employ yourself, what weather you have had. We have already had two or three snows here. The workmen are so slow in finishing the house I have rented here, that I know not when I shall have it ready, except one room which they promise me this week, and which will be my bedroom, study, dining-room, and parlor. I am not able to give any later news about peace or war than of October 16th, which I mentioned in my last to your sister. Wheat has fallen a few pence, and will, I think, continue to fall, slowly at first and rapidly after a while. Adieu, my dear Maria; kiss your sister for me, and assure Mr. Randolph of my affection. I will not tell you how much I love you, lest by rendering you vain, it might render you less worthy of my love.

Encore adieu,

TH.J

This is a scolding letter for you all. I nave not received a scrip of a pen from home since I left it. I think it so easy for you to write me one letter every week, which will be but once in the three weeks for each of you, when I write one every week, who have not one moment's repose from business, from the first to the last moment of the week.

Perhaps you think you have nothing to say to me. It is a great deal to say you are all well; or that one has a cold, another a fever, etc. besides, that there is not a sprig of grass that shoots uninteresting to me; nor anything that moves from yourself down to Bergère or Grizzle.' Write, then, my dear daughter, punctually on your day, and Mr. Randolph and Polly on theirs. I suspect you may have news to tell me of yourself of the most tender interest to me. Why silent then?

TO MARIA JEFFERSON.

PHILADELPHIA, Jan. 5th, 1791.

I did not write to you, my dear Poll, the last week, because I was really angry at receiving no letter. I have now been near nine weeks from home, and have never had a scrip of a pen, when by the regularity of the post I might receive your letters as frequently and as exactly as if I were at Charlottesville. I ascribed it at first to indolence, but the affection must be weak which is so long overruled by that. Adieu, TH. J.

To MARTHA JEFFERSON RANDOLPH.

PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 9th, 1791. MY DEAR MARTHA : Your two last letters are those which have given me the greatest pleasure of any I ever received from you. The one announced that you were become a notable housewife; the other, a mother. This last is undoubtedly the keystone of the arch of matrimonial happiness, as the first is its daily aliment. Accept my sincere congratulations for yourself and Mr. Randolph.

I hope you are getting well; towards which great care of yourself is necessary; for however advisable it is for those in health to expose themselves freely, it is not so for the sick. You will be out in time to begin your garden, and that will tempt you to be out a great deal, than which nothing will tend more to give you health

The originals brought by him from France, of the stock of the shepherd's dog, which was kept up at Monticello till within a short period of his death. Bergère's name is associated in the minds of Mrs. Randolph's daughters with a tradition illustrative of her reasoning powers. Having had assigned to her, among her "constitutional functions," the office of gathering up the poultry at nightfall, and seeing them "folded," and having observed that it is the nature of the feathered tribe to go to roost on cloudy days earlier than on others, she adapted her government to the character of her subjects, and used, in such weather, to drive them up without regard to the hour of sunset. (Note by a member of Mr. Jefferson's family.)

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LETTERS TO HIS DAUGHTERS.

[СНАР. І.

and strength. Remember me affectionately to Mr. Randolph and Polly, as well as to Miss Jenny.'

Yours sincerely.

TH. JEFFERSON.

TO MARIA JEFFERSON.

PHILADELPHIA, February 16th, 1791.

MY DEAR POLL:

At length I have received a letter from you. As the spell is now broke, I hope you will continue to write every three weeks. Observe I do not admit the excuse you make of not writing because your sister had not written the week before; let each write their own week without regard to what others do, or do not do. I congratulate you, my dear aunt,2 on your new title. I hope you pay a great deal of attention to your niece, and that you have begun to give her lessons on the harpsichord, in Spanish, etc. Tell your sister I make her a present of Gregory's Comparative View, inclosed herewith, and that she will find in it a great deal of useful advice for a young mother. I hope herself and the child are well. Kiss them both for me. Present me affectionately to Mr. Randolph and Miss Jenny. Mind your Spanish and your harpsichord well, and think often and always of Yours affectionately,

P. S.-Letter inclosed with the book for your sister.

TH. JEFFERSON.

TO MARIA JEFFERSON.

PHILADELPHIA, Mar. 9th, 1791.

MY DEAR MARIA:

I am happy to have at length a letter of yours to answer; for that which you wrote to me February 13th, came to hand February 28th. I hope our correspondence will now be more regular, that you will be no more lazy, and I no more in the pouts on that account. On the 27th of February I saw blackbirds and robinredbreasts, and on the 7th of this month I heard frogs for the first time this year. Have you noted the first appearance of these things at Monticello? I hope you have, and will continue to note every appearance, animal and vegetable, which indicates the approach of spring, and will communicate them to me. By these means we shall be able to compare the climates of Philadelphia and Monticello. Tell me when you shall have peas, etc., up; when everything comes to table; when you shall have the first chickens hatched; when every kind of tree blossoms, or puts forth leaves; when each kind of flower blooms. Kiss your sister and niece for me, and present me affectionately to Mr. Randolph and Miss Jenny.

Yours tenderly, my dear Maria,

TH. J.

1 Miss Jenny Eldridge, a "spinster," whose name is associated in the memories of Mr. Jefferson's grandchildren with several amusing peculiarities, and particularly her vast lore in family genealogies.

The meaning of this will be found explained in the letter to Martha, of February 9th.

The badness of the roads retards the post, so that I have received no letter this week from Monticello. I shall hope soon to have one from yourself; to know from that that you are perfectly reëstablished, that the little Anne is becoming a big one, that you have received Dr. Gregory's book and are daily profiting from it. This will hardly reach you in time to put you on the watch for the annular eclipse of the sun, which is to happen on Sunday sennight, to begin about sunrise. It will be such a one as is rarely to be seen twice in one life. I have lately received a letter from Fulwar Skipwith, who is consul for us in Martinique and Guadaloupe. He fixed himself first in the former, but has removed to the latter. Are any of your acquaintances in either of those islands? If they are, I wish you would write to them and recommend him to their acquaintance. He will be a sure medium through which you may exchange souvenirs with your friends of a more useful kind than those of the convent. He sent me half a dozen pots of very fine sweetmeats. Apples and cider are the greatest presents which can be sent to those islands. I can make those presents for you whenever you choose to write a letter to accompany them; only observing the season for apples. They had better deliver their letters for you to F. S. Skipwith. Things are going on well in France, the revolution being past all danger. The National Assembly being to separate soon, that event will seal the whole with security. Their islands, but most particularly St. Domingo and Martinique, are involved in a horrid civil war. Nothing can be more distressing than the situation of the inhabitants, as their slaves have been called into action, and are a terrible engine, absolutely ungovernable. It is worst in Martinique, which was the reason Mr. Skipwith left it. An army and fleet from France are expected every hour to quell the disorders. I suppose you are busily engaged in your garden. I expect full details on that subject as well as from Poll, that I may judge what sort of a gardener you make. Present me affectionately to all around you, and be assured of the tender and unalterable love of Yours,

TH. JEFFERSON.

TO MARIA JEFFERSON.

MY DEAR MARIA:

PHILADELPHIA, Mar. 31st, 1791.

That of March 6th came

I am happy to have a letter of yours to answer. to my hands on the 24th. By the by, you never acknowledged the receipt of my letters, nor tell me on what day they came to hand. I presume that by this time you have received the two dressing-tables with marble tops. I give one of them to your sister and the other to you; mine is here with the top broken in two. Mr. Randolph's letter, referring to me the name of your niece, was very long on the road. I answered it as soon as I received it, and hope the answer got duly to hand. Lest it should have been delayed, I repeated last week to your sister the name of Anne, which I had recommended as belonging to both families. I wrote you in my last that the frogs had begun their songs on the 7th; since that the blue-birds saluted us on the 17th; the weeping-willow began to leaf on the 18th; the lilac and gooseberry on the 25th, and the golden-willow on the 26th. I inclose for your sister three kinds of flowering beans, very beautiful and very rare. She must plant VOL. II.-2

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LETTERS TO HIS DAUGHTERS.

[CHAP. I.

and nourish them with her own hand this year in order to save enough seeds for herself and me. Tell Mr. Randolph I have sold my tobacco for five dollars per c., and the rise between this and September. Warehouse and shipping expenses in Virginia, freight and storage here, come to 28. 9d. a hundred, so that it is as if I had sold it in Richmond for 27s. 3d. credit till September, or half per cent. per month discount for the ready money. If he chooses it, his Bedford tobacco may be included in the sale. Kiss everybody for me.

Yours affectionately,

TH. JEFFERSON.

MY DEAR DAughter:

To MARTHA JEFFERSON RANDOLPH.

PHILADELPHIA, April 17, 1791.

Since I wrote last to you, which was on the 24th of March, I have received yours of March 22. I am indeed sorry to hear of the situation of Walter Gilmer, and shall hope the letters from Monticello will continue to inform me how he does. I know how much his parents will suffer, and how much he merited all their affection. Mrs. Trist has been so kind as to have your calash made, but either by mistake of the maker, or of myself, it is not lined with green. I have therefore desired a green lining to be got, which you can put in yourself if you prefer it. Mrs. Trist has observed that there is a kind of veil lately introduced here, and much approved. It fastens over the brim of the hat, and then draws round the neck as close or open as you please. I desire a couple to be made to go with the calash and other things. Mr. Lewis not liking to write letters, I do not hear from him; but I hope you are readily furnished with all the supplies and conveniences the estate affords. I shall not be able to see you till September, by which time the young grand-daughter will begin to look bold and knowing. I inclose you a letter to a woman, who lives, I believe, on Buck Island. It is from her sister in Paris, which I would wish you to send express.' I hope your garden is flourishing. Present me affectionately to Mr. Randolph and Polly.

I have received, my dear Maria, your letter of March 26th; I find I have counted too much on you as a Botanical and Zoölogical correspondent, for I undertook to affirm here that the fruit was not killed in Virginia, because I had a young daughter there who was in that kind of correspondence with me, and who, I was sure, would have mentioned it, if it had been so. However, I shall go on communicating to you whatever may contribute to a comparative estimate of the two climates, in hopes it will induce you to do the same to me. Instead of waiting to

Here is a sample of "democracy," as it lived in his bosom and manifested itself in his daily life. The woman whom he desires an "express" to be sent in search of with her letter-living somewhere on Buck Island, fifteen miles or more distant-was the sister of the wife of a groom in the stables of the Duke of Orleans. This man, a common soldier, had been one of the Convention prisoners at Charlottesville, and while there had married a poor girl in the neighborhood. (Note by a member of Mr. Jefferson's family.)