Washington, Feb. 15th, 1801.

Your letter, my dear Maria, of the 2d instant came to hand on the 8th. I should have answered it immediately, according to our arrangement, but that I thought by waiting to the 11th I might possibly be able to communicate something on the subject of the election. However, after four days of balloting, they are exactly where they were on the first. There is a strong expectation in some that they will coalesce to-morrow; but I know no foundation for it. Whatever event happens, I think I shall be at Monticello earlier than I formerly mentioned to you. I think it more likely I may be able to leave this place by the middle of March. I hope I shall find you at Monticello. The scene passing here makes me pant to be away from it—to fly from the circle of cabal, intrigue, and hatred, to one where all is love and peace.

Though I never doubted of your affections, my dear, yet the expressions of them in your letter give me ineffable pleasure. No, never imagine that there can be a difference with me between yourself and your sister. You have both such dispositions as engross my whole love, and each so entirely that there can be no greater degree of it than each possesses. Whatever absences I may be led into for a while, I look for happiness to the moment when we can all be settled together, no more to separate. I feel no impulse from personal ambition to the office now proposed to me, but on account of yourself and your sister and those dear to you. I feel a sincere wish, indeed, to see our Government brought back to its republican principles, to see that kind of government firmly fixed to which my whole life has been devoted. I hope we shall now see it so established, as that when I retire it may be under full security that we are to continue free and happy. As soon as the fate of election is over, I will drop a line to Mr. Eppes. I hope one of you will always write the moment you receive a letter from me. Continue to love me, my dear, as you ever have done, and ever have been and will be by yours, affectionately,

TH. JEFFERSON.

I give John Randolph's last dispatch:

Chamber of the House of Representatives,
February 17th.

On the thirty-sixth ballot there appeared this day ten States for Thomas Jefferson, four (New England) for A. Burr, and two blank ballots (Delaware and South Carolina). This was the second time we balloted to-day. The four Burrites of Maryland put blanks into the box of that State. The vote was therefore unanimous. Mr. Morris, of Vermont, left his seat, and the result was therefore Jeffersonian. Adieu. Tuesday, 2 o'clock P.M.

J. R., Jr.

I need not add that Mr. J. was declared duly elected.

In a letter written to his son-in-law, Mr. Randolph, Mr. Jefferson says:

To Thomas Mann Randolph.

A letter from Mr. Eppes informs me that Maria is in a situation which induces them not to risk a journey to Monticello, so we shall not have the pleasure of meeting them there. I begin to hope I may be able to leave this place by the middle of March. My tenderest love to my ever dear Martha, and kisses to the little one. Accept yourself sincere and affectionate salutation. Adieu.

Mr. Jefferson thought it becoming a Republican that his inauguration should be as unostentatious and free from display as possible—and such it was. An English traveller, who was in Washington at the time, thus describes him: "His dress was of plain cloth, and he rode on horseback to the Capitol without a single guard or even servant in his train, dismounted without assistance, and hitched the bridle of his horse to the palisades." He was accompanied to the Senate Chamber by a number of his friends, when, before taking the oath of office, he delivered his Inaugural Address, whose chaste and simple beauty is so familiar to the student of American History. I can not, however, refrain from giving here the eloquent close of this admirable State paper:

Extract from Inaugural Address.

I repair, then, fellow-citizens, to the post you have assigned me. With experience enough in subordinate offices to have seen the difficulties of this, the greatest of all, I have learned to expect that it will rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station with the reputation and favor which bring him into it. Without pretensions to that high confidence reposed in our first and great Revolutionary character, whose pre-eminent services had entitled him to the first place in his country's love, and destined for him the fairest page in the volume of faithful history, I ask so much confidence only as may give firmness and effect to the legal administration of your affairs. I shall often go wrong through defect of judgment. When right, I shall often be thought wrong by those whose positions will not command a view of the whole ground. I ask your indulgence for my own errors, which will never be intentional; and your support against the errors of others, who may condemn what they would not if seen in all its parts. The approbation implied by your suffrage is a consolation to me for the past; and my future solicitude will be to retain the good opinion of those who have bestowed it in advance, to conciliate that of others by doing them all the good in my power, and to be instrumental to the happiness and freedom of all.

Relying, then, on the patronage of your good-will, I advance with obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become sensible how much better choice it is in your power to make. And may that Infinite Power which rules the destinies of the universe lead our councils to what is best, and give them a favorable issue for your peace and prosperity.