without that fear.  Some symptoms make me suspect, that my proceedings to redress the abusive administration of tobacco by the Farmers General have indisposed towards me a powerful person in Philadelphia, who was profiting from that abuse.  An expression in the enclosed letter of M. de Calonne, would seem to imply, that I had asked the abolition of Mr. Morris’s contract.  I never did.  On the contrary, I always observed to them, that it would be unjust to annul that contract.  I was led to this, by principles both of justice and interest.  Of interest, because that contract would keep up the price of tobacco here to thirty-four, thirty-six, and thirty-eight livres, from which it will fall when it shall no longer have that support.  However, I have done what was right, and I will not so far wound my privilege of doing that, without regard to any man’s interest, as to enter into any explanations of this paragraph with him.  Yet I esteem him highly, and suppose that hitherto he had esteemed me.  You will see by Calonne’s letter, that we are doing what we can to get the trade of the United States put on a good footing.  I am now about setting out on a journey to the south of France, one object of which is to try the mineral waters there for the restoration of my hand; but another is, to visit all the seaports where we have trade, and to hunt up all the inconveniences under which it labors, in order to get them rectified.  I shall visit, and carefully examine too, the canal of Languedoc.  On my return, which will be early in the spring, I shall send you several livraisons of the Encyclopedie, and the plan of your house.  I wish to Heaven, you may continue in the disposition to fix it in Albemarle.  Short will establish himself there, and perhaps Madison may be tempted to do so.  This will be society enough, and it will be the great sweetener of our lives.  Without society, and a society to our taste, men are never contented.  The one here supposed, we can regulate to our minds, and we may extend our regulations to the sumptuary department, so as to set a good example to a country which needs it, and to preserve our own happiness clear of embarrassment.  You wish not to engage in the drudgery of the bar.  You have two asylums from that.  Either to accept a seat in the Council, or in the judiciary department.  The latter, however, would require a little previous drudgery at the bar, to qualify you to discharge your duty with satisfaction to yourself.  Neither of these would be inconsistent with a continued residence in Albemarle.  It is but twelve hours drive in a sulky from Charlottesville to Richmond, keeping a fresh horse always at the half-way, which would be a small annual expense.  I am in hopes, that Mrs. M. will have in her domestic cares occupation and pleasure sufficient to fill her time, and insure her against the tedium vitae:  that she will find, that the distractions of a town, and the waste of life under these, can bear no comparison with the