atives a report of the Secretary of
the Navy, in compliance with their resolution of the 14th of April last,
respecting prize agents, which report contains the information
requested.

JAMES MONROE.

MAY 24, 1824.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

In compliance with a resolution of the House of Representatives of the
13th instant, requesting the President to communicate any information
he may possess in relation to the intercourse and trade now carried on
between the people of the United States (and particularly the people
of the State of Missouri) and the Mexican Provinces, how and by what
route that trade or intercourse is carried on, in what it consists, the
distances, etc., the nations of Indians through which it passes, their
dispositions, whether pacific or otherwise, the advantages resulting or
likely to result from that trade or intercourse, I herewith transmit
a communication from the Department of State, which contains all the
information which has yet been collected in relation to those subjects.

JAMES MONROE.

MAY 24, 1824.

_To the House of Representatives of the United States_:

In compliance with a resolution of the 20th instant, I transmit
herewith to the House of Representatives a report of David Shriver,
superintendent of the Cumberland road, stating the manner in which the
appropriation made at the last session for the repair of that road has
been expended, and also the present condition of the road.

JAMES MONROE.

EIGHTH ANNUAL MESSAGE.

WASHINGTON, _December 7, 1824_.

_Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives_:

The view which I have now to present to you of our affairs, foreign and
domestic, realizes the most sanguine anticipations which have been
entertained of the public prosperity. If we look to the whole, our
growth as a nation continues to be rapid beyond example; if to the
States which compose it, the same gratifying spectacle is exhibited.
Our expansion over the vast territory within our limits has been
great, without indicating any decline in those sections from which the
emigration has been most conspicuous. We have daily gained strength by
a native population in every quarter--a population devoted to our happy
system of government and cherishing the bond of union with fraternal
affection. Experience has already shewn that the difference of climate
and of industry, proceeding from that cause, inseparable fr