Page:Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies, from the papers of Thomas Jefferson - Volume 1.djvu/248

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We are to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of June 3rd, informing us of your reception at the court of London.

I am, with sentiments of great respect and esteem, Dear Sir, your friend and servant,

TH: JEFFERSON.

LETTER LXIII. TO THE GOVERNOR OF VIRGINIA.

Paris, June 1C, 1785.

SIR,

I had the honor of receiving, the day before yesterday, the re solution of Council, of March the 10th, and your letter of March the 30th, and shall, with great pleasure, unite my endeavors with those of the Marquis de la Fayette and Mr. Barclay, for the pur pose of procuring the arms desired. Nothing can be more wise than this determination to arm our people, as it is impossible to say when our neighbors may think proper to give them exercise. I suppose that the establishing a manufacture of arms, to go hand in hand with the purchase of them from hence, is at present op posed by good reasons. This alone would make us independent for an article essential to our preservation ; and workmen could probably be either got here, or drawn from England, to be em barked hence.

In a letter of January the 12th, to Governor Harrison, I inform ed him of the necessity that the statuary should see General Wash ington ; that we should accordingly send him over unless the Ex ecutive disapproved of it, in which case I prayed to receive their pleasure. Mr. Houdon being now re-established in his health, and no countermand received, I hope this measure met the appro bation of the Executive : Mr. Houdon will therefore go over with Dr. Franklin, some time in the next month.

I have the honor of enclosing you the substance of propositions which have been made from London to the Farmers General of this country, to furnish them with the tobacco of Virginia and Maryland, which propositions were procured for me by the Mar quis de la Fayette. I take the liberty of troubling you with them, on a supposition that it may be possible to have this article furnish ed from those two States to this country, immediately, without its passing through the entrepot of London, and the returns for it be ing made, of course, in London merchandise. Twenty thousand hogs heads of tobacco a year, delivered here in exchange for the pro-