t we shall never unite to suppress their commerce, or
even to impede it. I think their hostility towards us is much more
deeply rooted at present, than during the war. In the arts, the most
striking thing I saw there, new, was the application of the principle
of the steam-engine to grist-mills. I saw eight pair of stones which
are worked by steam, and there are to be set up thirty pair in the same
house. A hundred bushels of coal, a day, are consumed at present. I do
not know in what proportion the consumption will be increased by the
additional gear.
Be so good as to present my respects to Mrs. Page and your family, to W.
Lewis, F. Willis, and their families, and to accept yourself assurances
of the sincere regard, with which I am, Dear Sir, your affectionate
friend and servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER VIII.--TO WILLIAM CARMICHAEL
TO WILLIAM CARMICHAEL.
Paris, May 5, 1786.
Dear Sir,
A visit of two months to England has been the cause of your not hearing
from me during that period. Your letters of February the 3rd, to Mr.
Adams and myself, and of February the 4th, to me, had come to hand
before my departure. While I was in London, Mr. Adams received the
letters giving information of Mr. Lambe's arrival at Algiers. In London,
we had conferences with a Tripoline ambassador, now at that court, named
Abdrahaman. He asked us thirty thousand guineas for a peace with his
court, and as much for Tunis, for which he said he could answer. What we
were authorized to offer, being to this, but as a drop to a bucket,
our conferences were repeated, only for the purpose of obtaining
information. If the demands of Algiers and Morocco should be
proportioned to this, according to their superior power, it is easy to
foresee that the United States will not buy a peace with money. What
principally led me to England was, the information that the Chevalier
del Pinto, Portuguese minister at that court, had received full powers
to treat with us. I accordingly went there, and, in the course of six
weeks, we arranged a commercial treaty between our two countries. His
powers were only to negotiate, not to sign. And as I could not wait, Mr.
Adams and myself signed, and the Chevalier del Pinto expected daily the
arrival of powers to do the same. The footing on which each has placed
the other, is that of the most favored nation. We wished much to have
had some privileges in their American possessions: but this was not
to be effec
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