hunted out Chatellux journal & had a reading of it. I had never so falsely estimated the character of a book. There are about six sentences of offensive bagatelles, which are all of them publicly known, because having respected individual characters they were like carrion for the buzzard curiosity. All the rest of the book (and it is a 4to of 186 pages) is either entertaining, or instructive & would be highly flattering to the Americans. He has visited all the principal fields of battle, enquired minutely into the detail of the actions, & has given what are probably the best accounts extant of them. He often finds occasion to criticise & to deny the British accounts from an inspection of the ground. I think to write to him. recommend the expunging the few exceptionable passages & publication of the rest. I have had an opportunity here of examining Bynkershoek's works. There are about a fourth part of them which you would like to have. They are the following tracts. Questiones juris publici-de lege Rhodeâ-de dominio maris—du Juge conopetent des Ambassadeurs, for this last if not the rest has been translated into French with notes by Barbeyrae. I have had from Boirod & Gaillard a copy of Mussenbroeck's cours de Physique. It is certainly the most comprehensive & most accurate body of Nat! Philosophy which has been ever published. I would recommend to you to get it, or I will get that and any other books you want from Boirod or elsewhere. I hope you have found access to my library. I beg you to make free use of it. Key, the steward is living there now & of course will be always in the way. Monroe is buying land almost adjoining me. Short will do the same. What would I not give [if] you could fall into the circle. With such a society I could once more venture home & lay myself up for the residue of life, quitting all it's contentions which grow daily more and more insupportable. Think of it. To render it practicable only requires you to think it so. Life is of no value but as it brings us gratifications. Among the most valuable of these is rational society. It informs the mind, sweetens the temper, chears our spirits, and promotes health. There is a little farm of 140 a adjoining me, & within two miles, all of good land, tho' old, with a small indifferent house on it, the whole worth not more than £250. Such a one might be a farm of experiment & support a little table & household. It is on the road to Orange & so much nearer than I am. It is convenient enough for supplementary supplies from thence. Once more think of it, and Adieu. DRAFT OF DEED OF CESSION OF NORTHWEST J. MSS. [March 1, 1784.] To all who shall see these presents we [here name the delegates] the underwritten delegates for the Commonwealth of Virginia in the Congress of the United States of America send greeting. Whereas the general assembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia at their sessions begun on the 20th day of Octob. 1783, passed an 1 The deed as finally executed is in the Journals of Congress for March 1, 1784. This rough draft is in Jefferson's handwriting. Act entituled 'An act to authorise the delegates &'-in these words following to wit 'Whereas the Congress &c.' [reciting the act verbatim.] And whereas the sd General Assembly by their Resolution of June 6th 1783, had constituted & appointed us the sd A. B. C. & delegates to represent the sd Commonwealth in Congress for one year from the first Monday in November then next following, which resolution remains in full force. Now therefore know ye that we the sd A. B. C. & by virtue of the power & authority, committed to us by the act of the sd. General Assembly of Virginia before recited, and in the name & for & on behalf of the sd Commonwealth do by these presents convey, transfer, assign, & make over unto the United States in Congress assembled for the benefit of the sd States, Virginia inclusive, all right, title & claim as well of soil as of jurisdiction which the sd. Commonwealth hath to the territory or tract of country within the limits of the Virginia charter, situate, lying & being to the Northwest of the river Ohio to and for the uses & purposes and on the conditions of the sd recited act. In testimony whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names and affixed our seals in Congress the day of in the year of our lord 1784, and of the independance of the United States the eighth. Signed, sealed and delivered in presence of REPORT ON GOVERNMENT FOR WESTERN TERRITORY.' C. C. [March 1, 1784.] The Committee appointed to prepare a plan for the temporary Government of the Western territory have agreed to the following resolutions : 1 Endorsed: "Report of Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Chase, Mr. Howell. Temporary Governm of Western Country Delivered I March 1784. Ent-Read.— March 3. Monday next assigned for the consideration of this report. March Resolved that the territory ceded or to be ceded by Individual States to the United States whensoever the same shall have been purchased of the Indian Inhabitants & offered for sale by the U. S. shall be formed into distinct States bounded in the following manner as nearly as such cessions will admit, that is to say; Northwardly & Southwardly by parallels of latitude so that each state shall comprehend from South to North two degrees of latitude beginning to count from the completion of thirty-one degrees North of the equator, but any territory Northwardly of the 47th degree shall make part of the state-next below, and Eastwardly & Westwardly they shall be bounded, those on the Mississippi by that river on one side and the meridian of the lowest point of the rapids of Ohio on the other; and those adjoining on the East by the same meridian on their Western side, and on their eastern by the meridian of the Western cape of the mouth of the Great Kanhaway. And the territory eastward of this last meridian between the Ohio, Lake Erie & Pennsylvania shall be one state. That the settlers within the territory so to be purchased & offered for sale shall, either on their own petition, or on the order of Congress, receive authority from them, with appointments of time and place for their free males of full age to meet together for the purpose of establishing a temporary government, to adopt the constitution & laws of any one of these states, so that such laws nevertheless shall be subject to alteration by their ordinary legislature, and to erect, subject to a like alteration counties or townships for the election of members for their legislature. That such temporary government shall only continue in force in any state until it shall have acquired 20,000 free inhabitants, 17. 1784. recommitted."-There is no record of the appointment of this committee, but it must have been before Feb. 21, 1784, for on that date Howells wrote to Arnold (Rhode Island and the Continental Congress, 479), stating that the committee had agreed to this report, and sketching its outlines. It was probably appointed before Congress adjourned to Annapolis, Nov. 4, 1783, for Howells wrote that the subject was largely debated at Princeton last summer," but the committee did not report till the Virginia cession had been formally signed, and accepted by Congress. This report is entirely in Jefferson's handwriting, as will be seen by the facsimile. It was recommitted to the original committee, who reported a substitute for it, March 22, 1784, which is printed in this collection under that date. |