despising wealth in competition with insult or injury,
enterprising and energetic as any nation on earth,--these circumstances
render it impossible that France and the United States can continue long
friends when they meet in so irritable a position.... The day that France
takes possession of New Orleans fixes the sentence which is to restrain
her forever within her low-water mark.... From that moment we must marry
ourselves to the British fleet and nation."

Thus, at a moment's notice, and in obedience to a vital change in
circumstance, Jefferson threw aside the policy of a lifetime, suppressed
his liking for France and his dislike for England, and entered upon that
radically new course which, as he foresaw, the interests of the United
States would require.

Livingston, thus primed, began negotiations for the purchase of New
Orleans; and Jefferson hastily dispatched Monroe, as a special envoy, for
the same purpose, armed, it is supposed, with secret verbal instructions,
to buy, if possible, not only New Orleans, but the whole of Louisiana.
Monroe had not a word in writing to show that in purchasing Louisiana--if
the act should be repudiated by the nation--he did not exceed his
instructions. But, as Mr. Henry Adams remarks, "Jefferson's friends always
trusted him perfectly."

The moment was most propitious, for England and France were about to close
in that terrific struggle which ended at Waterloo, and Napoleon was
desperately in need of money. After some haggling the bargain was
concluded, and, for the very moderate sum of fifteen million dollars, the
United States became possessed of a territory which more than doubled its
area.

The purchase of Louisiana was confessedly an unconstitutional, or at least
an extra-constitutional act, for the Constitution gave no authority to the
President to acquire new territory, or to pledge the credit of the United
States in payment. Jefferson himself thought that the Constitution ought
to be amended in order to make the purchase legal; but in this he was
overruled by his advisers.

Thus, Jefferson's first administration ended with a brilliant achievement;
but this public glory was far more than outweighed by a private loss. The
President's younger daughter, Mrs. Eppes, died in April, 1804; and in a
letter to his old friend, John Page, he said: "Others may lose of their
abundance, but I, of my wants, have, lost even the half of all I had. My
evening prospects now hang on the s