For the notice you take of my public services, civil and military, and your kind wishes for my personal happiness, I beg you to accept my cordial thanks. Those services, and greater, had I possessed ability to render them, were due to the unanimous calls of my country, and its approbation is my abundant reward.
When contemplating the period of my retirement, I saw virtuous and enlightened men, among whom I relied on the discernment and patriotism of my fellow-citizens to make the proper choice of a successor; men who would require no influential example to ensure to the United States "an able, upright, and energetic Administration." To such men I shall cheerfully yield the palm of genius and talents to serve our common country; but, at the same time, I hope I may be indulged in expressing the consoling reflection, (which consciousness suggests,) and to bear it with me to my grave, that none can serve it with purer intentions than I have done, or with a more disinterested zeal.
G. WASHINGTON.
The Senate returned to their own Chamber, and then adjourned.
Wednesday, December 21.
Theodore Sedgwick, appointed a Senator by the State of Massachusetts, in place of Caleb Strong, resigned, attended, produced his credentials, and the oath required by law being administered to him, he took his seat in the Senate.
Tuesday, December 27.
John Eager Howard, appointed a Senator by the State of Maryland, in place of Richard Potts, resigned, produced his credentials, and the oath required by law being administered, he took his seat in the Senate.
Josiah Tattnall, from the State of Georgia, attended.