And indeed it would be
of happy augury to begin at once this concert of action here, on the
invitation of either to the other government, while the way might be
preparing for withdrawing our cruisers from Europe, and preventing naval
collisions there which daily endanger our peace.
*****
Accept assurances of the sincerity of my friendship and respect for you.
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CLIV.--TO JOHN ADAMS, August 15, 1820
TO JOHN ADAMS.
Monticello, August 15, 1820.
I am a great defaulter, my Dear Sir, in our correspondence, but
prostrate health rarely permits me to write; and when it does, matters
of business imperiously press their claims. I am getting better however,
slowly, swelled legs being now the only serious symptom, and these, I
believe, proceed from extreme debility. I can walk but little; but I
ride six or eight miles a day without fatigue; and within a few days,
I shall endeavor to visit my other home, after a twelvemonth's absence
from it. Our University, four miles distant, gives me frequent exercise,
and the oftener, as I direct its architecture. Its plan is unique, and
it is becoming an object of curiosity for the traveller. I have lately
had an opportunity of reading a critique on this institution in your
North American Review of January last, having been not without anxiety
to see what that able work would say of us: and I was relieved on
finding in it much coincidence of opinion, and even where criticisms
where indulged, I found they would have been obviated had the
developements of our plan been fuller.
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