decided on and carried into full execution, will require very considerable length of time. To place under the same delay, the private claims which I have the honor to present to your Excellency, would be hard on the persons interested; because these claims have no connection with the system of commercial connection, which may be established between the two nations, nor with the particular form of our administration. The justice due to them is complete, and the present administration as competent to final settlement as any future one will be, should a future change take place. These individuals have already lingered nine years, in expectation of their hard and perilous earnings. Time lessens their numbers continually, disperses their representatives, weakens the evidence of their right, and renders more and more impracticable, his majesty's dispositions to repair the private injury, to which public circumstances constrained him. These considerations, the just and honorable intentions of your Excellency, and the assurances you give us in your letter, that no delay is wished on your part, give me strong hopes that we may speedily obtain that final arrangement, which express instructions render it my duty to urge. I have the honor, therefore, of agreeing with your Excellency, that the settlement of this matter, formerly begun at Paris, shall be continued there; and to ask that you will be pleased to give powers and instructions for this purpose, to such persons as you shall think proper, and in such full form as may prevent those delays, to which the distance between Copenhagen and Paris might otherwise expose us.

I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most profound respect, your Excellency's most obedient, and most humble ser

vant.

TO MR THOMAS DIGGES.

PARIS, June 19, 1788.

SIR,—I have duly received your favor of May 12, as well as that of the person who desires information on the state of cotton

manufactures in America, and for his interest and safety I beg leave to address to you the answer to his queries.

In general, it is impossible that manufactures should succeed in America, from the high price of labor. This is occasioned by the great demand of labor for agriculture. A manufacturer going from Europe will turn to labor of other kinds if he finds more to be got by it, and he finds some employment so profitable, that he can soon lay up money enough to buy fifty acres of land, to the culture of which he is irresistibly tempted by the independence in which that places him, and the desire of having a wife and family around him. If any manufactures can succeed there, it will be that of cotton. I must observe for his information that this plant grows nowhere in the United States northward of the Potomac, and not in quantity till you get southward as far as York and James Rivers. I know nothing of the manufacture which is said to be set up at Richmond. It must have taken place since 1783, when I left Virginia. In that State (for it is the only one I am enabled to speak of with certainty) there is no manufacture of wire or of cotton cards; or if any, it is not worth notice. No manufacture of stocking-weaving, consequently none for making the machine; none of cotton clothing of any kind whatever for sale; though in almost every family some is manufactured for the use of the family, which is always good in quality, and often tolerably fine. In the same way they make excellent stockings of cotton, weaving it in like manner, carried on principally in the family way: among the poor, the wife weaves generally; and the rich either have a weaver among their servants or employ their poor neighbors. Cotton cost in Virginia from 12d. to 18d. sterling the pound before the war, probably it is a little raised since. Richmond is as good a place for a manufactory as any in that State, and perhaps the best as to its resources for this business. Cotton clothing is very much the taste of the country. A manufacturer, on his landing, should ap ply to the well-informed farmers and gentlemen of the country. Their information will be more disinterested than that of merchants, and they can better put him into the way of disposing

of his workmen in the cheapest manner till he has time to look about him and decide how and where he will establish himself. Such is the hospitality in that country, and their disposition to assist strangers, that he may boldly go to any good house he sees, and make the inquiry he needs. He will be sure to be kindly received, honestly informed, and accommodated in an hospitable way, without any other introduction than an information who he is and what are his views. It is not the policy of the government in that country to give any aid to works of any kind. They let things take their natural course without help or impediment, which is generally the best policy. More particularly as to myself, I must say that I have not the authority nor the means of assisting any persons in their passage to that country. I have the honor to be, with sentiments of perfect esteem, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO MR. RUTLEDGE.

PARIS, January 19, 1788.

DEAR SIR,-Having omitted to ask you how I should address letters to you, I am obliged to put the present under cover to Mr. Shippen, to the care of his banker at Amsterdam. Enclosed you will receive a letter lately come to my hands, as also such notes as I have been able to scribble very hastily and undigested. I am ashamed of them; but I will pay willingly that price, if they may, on a single occasion, be useful to you. I will at some future moment find time to write the letters for Frankfort, Florence, Milan, Nice and Marseilles, which those notes will point out, and lodge them on your route, if you will be so good as to keep me always informed how and where I must send letters to you. I would suggest an alteration in the route I had proposed to you; that is, to descend the Danube from Vienna, so as to go to Constantinople, and from thence to Naples and up Italy.

This must depend on your time, and the information

you may be able to get as to the safety with which you may pass through the Ottoman territories. It is believed the Emperor is making overtures for peace. Should this take place it would lessen the difficulties of such a tour. In the meantime, this gleam of peace is counterbalanced by the warlike preparations of Sweden and Denmark, known to be made under the suggestions of the Court of London. In this country there is great internal ferment. I am of opinion the new regulations will be maintained. Perhaps the Cour pleniere may be amended in its composition, and the States General called at an earlier period than was intended. We have no accounts yet of the decision of Maryland, South Carolina, or Virginia on the subject of the new Constitution. Yet it seems probable they will accept it in the same manner Massachusetts has done; and I see nothing improbable in the supposition that our new government may be in motion by the beginning of November. I must press on you, my dear Sir, a very particular attention to the climate and culture of the olive tree. This is the most interesting plant in existence for South Carolina and Georgia. You will see in various places that it gives being to whole villages in places where there is not soil enough to subsist a family by the means of any other culture. But consider it as the means of bettering the condition of your slaves in South Carolina. See in the poorer parts of France and Italy what a number of vegetables are rendered eatable by the aid of a little oil, which would otherwise be useless. Remark very particularly the northern limits of this tree; and whether it exists by the help of shelter from the mountains, &c. I know this is the case in France. I wish to know where the northern limit of this plant crosses the Apennines; where it crosses the Adriatic and the Archipelago, and if possible what course it takes through Asia. The fig, the dried raisin, the pistache, the date, the caper, are all very interesting objects for your study. Should you not in your passage through countries where they are cultivated inform yourself of their hardiness, their culture, the manner of transporting, &c., you might hereafter much repent it. Both then and now I hope you will excuse me for

suggesting them to your attention; not omitting the article of rice also, of which you will see species different from your own. I beg you to make use of me on all possible occasions and in all the ways in which I can serve you, not omitting that of money, should any disappointment take place in your own arrangements. Mr. Berard's money was paid to Bayoker & Co. as you desired. I have the honor to be, with very great esteem, dear Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO T. LEE SHIPPEN, ESQ.

PARIS, June 19, 1788.

DEAR SIR,-I have been honored with your favor of May 20, and take the first possible moment of acknowledging it, and of enclosing such notes as my recollection has suggested to me might be of service to you on your route. They have been scribbled so hastily and so informally that I would not send them, did not a desire of accommodating yourself and Mr. Rutledge get the better of my self-love. You will have seen in the Leyden gazette the principal articles of intelligence received from America since you left us, and which I have furnished to Mr. Dumas for that paper. The account of the riot in New York was given me by Mr. Paradise, who was there at the time, and who with his lady is now here. You may, perhaps, meet them at Venice. Mr. Jay and Baron Steuben were wounded with stones in that riot. General Washington writes me word he thinks Virginia will accept of the new Constitution. It appears to me, in fact, from all information, that its rejection would drive the States to despair and bring on events which cannot be foreseen; and that its adoption is become absolutely necessary. It will be easier to get the assent of nine States to correct what is wrong in the way pointed out by the Constitution itself, than to get thirteen to concur in a new convention and another plan of confederation. I therefore sincerely pray that