Page:Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies, from the papers of Thomas Jefferson - Volume 1.djvu/160

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In 1789, and 1790, I had a great number of olive plants, of the best kind, sent from Marseilles to Charleston, for South Carolina and Georgia. ‘They were planted, and are flourishing; and, though not yet multiplied, they will be the germ of that cultivation m those States.

In 1790, I got a cask of heavy upland rice, from the river Den- bigh, in Africa, about lat. 9° 30’ North, which I sent to Charles- ton, in hopes it might supercede the culture of the wet rice, which renders South Carolina and Georgia so pestilential through the summer. It was divided, and a part sent to Georgia. I know not whether it has been attended to in South Carolina; but it has spread in the upper parts of Georgia, so as to have become almost general, and is highly prized. Perhaps it may answer in Tennes- see and Kentucky. ‘The greatest service which can be rendered any country is, to add an useful plant to its culture ; especially, a bread grain; next in value to bread is oil.

Whether the Act for the more general diffusion of knowledge will ever be carried into complete effect, I know not. It was re- ceived, by the legislature, with great enthusiasm at first; and a small effort was made in 1796, by the Act to establish public schools, to carry a part of it into effect, viz. that for the establishment of free English schools; but the option given to the courts has de- feated the intention of the Act.*

[Note H.]

New York, October 13, 1789. SiR,

In the selection of characters to fill the important offices of Government, in the United States, I was naturally led to contem- plate the talents and dispositions which I knew you to possess and entertain for the service of your country ; and without being able to consult your inclination, or to derive any knowledge of your in- tention from your letters, either to myself or to any other of your friends, | was determined, as well by motives of private regard, as a conviction of public propriety, to nominate you for the De- partment of State, which, under its present organization, involves many of the most interesting objects of the Executive authority.

[* It appears, from a blank spacc at the bottom of this paper, that a continu- ation had been intended. Indeed, from the loose manner in which the above notes are written, it may be inferred, that they were originally intended as memoranda only, to be used in some more permanent form.]