rs of such or such
numbers, north or south, east or west; all this is explained
by the document annexed, No. 7, viz. _The Ordinance for
ascertaining the mode of locating and disposing of lands in
the Western Territory. This is their plan and means for
paying off their national debt, and they seem very intent
upon doing it._ I should observe that their debt consists of
two parts, namely, domestic and foreign. The sale of lands
is to be appropriated to the former.

"The domestic debt may perhaps be nine or ten millions, and
the foreign debt two or three. For payment of the foreign
debt it is proposed to lay a tax of five per cent upon all
imports until discharged, which, I am informed, has already
been agreed to by most of the States, and probably will
soon be confirmed by the rest. Upon the whole, it appears
that this plan is as prudently conceived and as judiciously
arranged, as to the end proposed, as any experienced cabinet
of European ministers could have devised or planned any
similar project. The second point which appears to me to be
deserving of attention, respecting the immense cession of
territory to the United States at the late peace, is a point
_which will perhaps in a few years become an unparalleled
phenomenon in the political world_. As soon as the national
debt of the United States shall be discharged by the sale of
one portion of those lands, we shall then see the
Confederate Republic in a new character, as a proprietor of
lands, either for sale or to let upon rents, while other
nations may be struggling under debts too enormous to be
discharged either by economy or taxation, and while they may
be laboring to raise ordinary and necessary supplies by
burdensome impositions upon their own persons and
properties. _Here will be a nation possessed of a new and
unheard of financial organ of stupendous magnitude, and in
process of time of unmeasured value, thrown into their lap
as a fortuitous superfluity, and almost without being sought
for._

"When such an organ of revenue begins to arise into produce
and exertion, what public uses it may be applicable to, or
to what abuses and perversions it might be rendered
subservient, is far beyond the reach of probable discussion
now. Such discussions would only be vi