To John Jay.
The connection of your offices will necessarily connect you in acquaintance; but I beg leave to present him to you on account of his personal as well as his public character. You will find him open, communicative, candid, simple in his manners, and a declared enemy to ostentation and luxury. He goes with a resolution to add no aliment to it by his example, unless he finds that the dispositions of our countrymen require it indispensably. Permit me, at the same time, to solicit your friendly notice, and through you, that also of Mrs. Jay, to Madame la Marquise de Brehan, sister-in-law to Monsieur de Moustier. She accompanies him, in hopes that a change of climate may assist her feeble health, and also that she may procure a more valuable education for her son, and safer from seduction, in America than in France. I think it impossible to find a better woman, more amiable, more modest, more simple in her manners, dress, and way of thinking. She will deserve the friendship of Mrs. Jay, and the way to obtain hers is to receive her and treat her without the shadow of etiquette.
On the eve of her departure for America, Jefferson wrote the following graceful note of adieu:
To Madame de Brehan.
Paris, October 9th, 1787.
Persuaded, Madam, that visits at this moment must be troublesome, I beg you to accept my adieus in this form. Be assured that no one mingles with them more regret at separating from you. I will ask your permission to inquire of you by letter sometimes how our country agrees with your health and your expectations, and will hope to hear it from yourself. The imitation of European manners, which you will find in our towns, will, I fear, be little pleasing. I beseech you to practice still your own, which will furnish them a model of what is perfect. Should you be singular, it will be by excellence, and after a while you will see the effect of your example.
Heaven bless you, Madam, and guard you under all circumstances—give you smooth waters, gentle breezes, and clear skies, hushing all its elements into peace, and leading with its own hand the favored bark, till it shall have safely landed its precious charge on the shores of our new world.
TH. JEFFERSON.
The following pleasant letter is to another of his lady friends:
To Madame de Corny.
Paris, October 18th, 1787.
I now have the honor, Madam, to send you the Memoir of M. de Calonnes. Do not injure yourself by hurrying its perusal. Only when you shall have read it at your leisure, be so good as to send it back, that it may be returned to the Duke of Dorset. You will read it with pleasure. It has carried comfort to my heart, because it must do the same to the King and the nation. Though it does not prove M. de Calonnes to be more innocent than his predecessors, it shows him not to have been that exaggerated scoundrel which the calculations and the clamors of the public have supposed. It shows that the public treasures have not been so inconceivably squandered as the Parliaments of Grenoble, Toulouse, etc., had affirmed. In fine, it shows him less wicked, and France less badly governed, than I had feared. In examining my little collection of books, to see what it could furnish you on the subject of Poland, I find a small piece which may serve as a supplement to the history I had sent you. It contains a mixture of history and politics, which I think you will like.
How do you do this morning? I have feared you exerted and exposed yourself too much yesterday. I ask you the question, though I shall not await its answer. The sky is clearing, and I shall away to my hermitage. God bless you, my dear Madam, now and always. Adieu.
TH. JEFFERSON.
In a letter written to Mr. Donald in the year 1788, his weariness of public life shows itself in the following lines: