ices, to show, that after making a reasonable
deduction for sorting, and leaving a reasonable profit to the retailer,
there should still remain a great wholesale price. I shall wish to know
from you, how much your cargo of rice shipped to Berard netts you, and
how much it would have _netted_ in hard money, if you had sold it at
home.

You promise, in your letter of October the 23rd, 1787, to give me in
your next, at large, the conjectures of your philosopher on the descent
of the Creek Indians from the Carthaginians, supposed to have been
separated from Hanno's fleet, during his periplus. I shall be very glad
to receive them, and see nothing impossible in his conjecture. I am glad
he means to appeal to similarity of language, which I consider as the
strongest kind of proof it is possible to adduce. I have somewhere read,
that the language of the ancient Carthaginians is still spoken by their
descendants, inhabiting the mountainous interior parts of Barbary, to
which they were obliged to retire by the conquering Arabs. If so, a
vocabulary of their tongue can still be got, and if your friend will get
one of the Creek languages, the comparison will decide. He probably may
have made progress in this business: but if he wishes any inquiries to
be made on this side the Atlantic, I offer him my services cheerfully;
my wish being, like his to ascertain the history of the American
aborigines.

I congratulate you on the accesion of your State to the new federal
constitution. This is the last I have yet heard of, but I expect daily
to hear that my own has followed the good example, and suppose it to be
already established. Our government wanted bracing. Still we must take
care not to run from one extreme to another; not to brace too high. I
own, I join those in opinion, who think a bill of rights necessary. I
apprehend too, that the total abandonment of the principle of rotation
in the offices of President and Senator, will end in abuse. But my
confidence is, that there will, for a long time, be virtue and good
sense enough in our countrymen, to correct abuses. We can surely boast
of having set the world a beautiful example of a government reformed by
reason alone, without bloodshed. But the world is too far oppressed to
profit by the example. On this side of the Atlantic, the blood of the
people has become an inheritance, and those who fatten on it, will
not relinquish it easily. The struggle in this country is, as yet,
of doub