as wolves do on the blood of the lamb. But the printers
and the public are very different personages. The former may lead the
latter a little out of their track, while the deviation is insensible:
but the moment they usurp their direction and that of their government,
they will be reduced to their true places. The two last Congresses have
been the theme of the most licentious reprobation for printers thirsting
after war, some against France, and some against England. But the people
wish for peace with both. They feel no incumbency on them to become
the reformers of the other hemisphere, and to inculcate, with fire and
sword, a return to moral order. When, indeed, peace shall become more
losing than war, they may owe to their interest, what these Quixottes
are clamoring for on false estimates of honor. The public are unmoved by
these clamors, as the re-election of their legislators shows, and they
are firm to their executive on the subject of the more recent clamors.

We are suffering here both in the gathered and the growing crop. The
lowness of the river, and great quantity of produce brought to Milton
this year, render it almost impossible to get our crops to market.
This is the case of mine as well as yours: and the Hessian fly appears
alarmingly in our growing crop. Every thing is in distress for the want
of rain.

Present me respectfully to Mrs. Monroe, and accept yourself assurances
of my constant and affectionate esteem.

Th: Jefferson.

LETTER XCVII.--TO GENERAL DEARBORN, August 14, 1811

TO GENERAL DEARBORN.

Poplar Forest, August 14, 1811.

Dear General and Friend,

*****

I am happy to learn that your own health is good, and I hope it will
long continue so. The friends we left behind us have fallen out by the
way. I sincerely lament it, because I sincerely esteem them all, and
because it multiplies schisms where harmony is safety. As far as I have
been able to judge, however, it has made no sensible impression against
the government. Those who were murmuring before are a little louder now;
but the mass of our citizens is firm and unshaken. It furnishes, as an
incident, another proof that they are perfectly equal to the purposes of
self-government, and that we have nothing to fear for its stability. The
spirit, indeed, which manifests itself among the tories of your quarter,
although I believe there is a majority there sufficient to keep it down
in peaceable times, leaves me not without som