We find the following interesting passage in a letter from Jefferson to M. Grand, written on the 23d of April:
The good old Dr. Franklin, so long the ornament of our country, and I may say of the world, has at length closed his eminent career. He died on the 17th instant, of an imposthume of his lungs, which having suppurated and burst, he had not strength to throw off the matter, and was suffocated by it. His illness from this imposthume was of sixteen days. Congress wear mourning for him, by a resolve of their body.
Nearly a year later we find him writing to the President of the National Assembly of France as follows:
I have it in charge from the President of the United States of America, to communicate to the National Assembly of France the peculiar sensibility of Congress to the tribute paid to the memory of Benjamin Franklin by the enlightened and free representatives of a great nation, in their decree of the 11th of June, 1790.
That the loss of such a citizen should be lamented by us among whom he lived, whom he so long and eminently served, and who feel their country advanced and honored by his birth, life, and labors, was to be expected. But it remained for the National Assembly of France to set the first example of the representatives of one nation doing homage, by a public act, to the private citizen of another, and, by withdrawing arbitrary lines of separation, to reduce into one fraternity the good and the great, wherever they have lived or died.
Jefferson's health was not good during the spring of the year 1790, and although he remained at his post he was incapacitated for business during the whole of the month of May. He was frequently prostrated from the effects of severe headaches, which sometimes lasted for two or three days. His health was not re-established before July.
I give now his letters home, which were written to his daughters. Mrs. Randolph was living at Monticello, and Maria, or "little Poll," now not quite twelve years old, was at Eppington on a visit to her good Aunt Eppes. These letters give an admirable picture of Jefferson as the father, and betray an almost motherly tenderness of love for, and watchfulness over, his daughters. Martha, though a married woman, is warned of the difficulties and little cares of her new situation in life, and receives timely advice as to how to steer clear of them; while little Maria is urged to prosecute her studies, to be good and industrious, in terms so full of love as to make his fatherly advice almost irresistible. The letters show, too, his longing for home, and how eagerly he craved the small news, as well as the great, of the loved ones he had left behind in Virginia. I give sometimes an extract, instead of the whole letter.
To Martha Jefferson Randolph.—[Extract.]
New York, April 4th, 1790.
I am anxious to hear from you of your health, your occupations, where you are, etc. Do not neglect your music. It will be a companion which will sweeten many hours of life to you. I assure you mine here is triste enough. Having had yourself and dear Poll to live with me so long, to exercise my affections and cheer me in the intervals of business, I feel heavily the separation from you. It is a circumstance of consolation to know that you are happier, and to see a prospect of its continuance in the prudence and even temper of Mr. Randolph and yourself. Your new condition will call for abundance of little sacrifices. But they will be greatly overpaid by the measure of affection they secure to you. The happiness of your life now depends on the continuing to please a single person. To this all other objects must be secondary, even your love for me, were it possible that could ever be an obstacle. But this it never can be. Neither of you can ever have a more faithful friend than myself, nor one on whom you can count for more sacrifices. My own is become a secondary object to the happiness of you both. Cherish, then, for me, my dear child, the affection of your husband, and continue to love me as you have done, and to render my life a blessing by the prospect it may hold up to me of seeing you happy. Kiss Maria for me if she is with you, and present me cordially to Mr. Randolph; assuring yourself of the constant and unchangeable love of yours, affectionately,
TH. JEFFERSON.
His daughter Maria, to whom the following letter is addressed, was at the time, as I have said, not quite twelve years old.
To Mary Jefferson.