Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 09.djvu/48

Rh, April 28th, 1804.

Dear Sir,—I reached this place on last evening. I have been detained on my journey, since I had the pleasure of meeting you, four days by high waters and an inflammation in the leg, which has in a great measure subsided, but I am not free from pain.

The President is at Monticello. He has lost his daughter, Mrs. Epps. Not a hint who is to be appointed to the government of New Orleans. I did not call to see the President. My reasons I will concisely state, and leave you to judge whether he had made the appointment. In case I had waited upon him, and the office of governor of New Orleans not filled, it would have been perhaps construed as the call of a courtier; and of all characters on earth my feeling despise a man capable of cringing to power for a benefit or office. And such characters as are capable of bending for the sake of an office are badly calculated for a representative system, where merit alone should lead to preferment. These being my sensations and believing that a call upon him under present existing circumstances might be construed as the act of a courtier, I traveled on, engaging my own feelings; and let me declare to you that before I would violate my own ideas of propriety, I would yield up any office in the government, were I in possession of the most honorable and lucrative. Who the choice is to fall on is not known here, unless to the Secretary of State. But I have reasons to conclude that Mr. Claibourne will not fill that office. I have also reasons to believe that if a suitable character can be found who is master of the French language that he will be preferred. I think that a proper qualification for the governor of that country to possess, provided it is accompanied with other necessary ones. I never had an sanguine expectations of filling the office; if I should, it will be more than I expect. But permit me here again to repeat that the friendly attention of my friends, and those particularly that I am confident acted from motives of pure friendship to me (among whom I rank you), never shall be forgotten. Gratitude is always the concomitant of a bosom susceptible of true friendship, and if I know myself my countenance never says to a man that I am his friends but my heart beats in unison with it. Permit me here, with that candor that you will always find me to possess, to state that I am truly gratified to find that your constituents alone are not the only part of the Union that think highly of your legislative conduct; it extends as far as your speeches have been read, and you are known as a member of the representative branch. May you continue to grow in popularity on the basis of your own merit,