d have been the last to disturb you with the application; but it
will really be rendering our country a service greater than it is in
the power of any other individual to render. To save you the trouble of
hunting the several documents from which this statement is to be taken,
I have collected them here completely, and enclose them to you.

Logan's bill has passed. On this subject it is hardly necessary for me
to declare to you, on every thing sacred, that the part they ascribed to
me was entirely a calumny. Logan called on me, four or five days before
his departure, and asked and received a certificate (in my private
capacity) of his citizenship and circumstances of life, merely as a
protection, should he be molested in the present turbulent state of
Europe. I have given such to an hundred others, and they have been much
more frequently asked and obtained by tories than whigs.

*****

Accept my sincere prayers for long and happy years to you still, and my
affectionate salutations and adieu.

Th: Jefferson.

LETTER CCXLVII.--TO JAMES MADISON, February 5, 1799

TO JAMES MADISON.

Philadelphia, February 5, 1799.

Dear Sir,

I wrote you last on the 30th of January; since which yours of the 25th
has been received.

*********

The bill for continuing the suspension of intercourse with France and
her dependencies, is still before the Senate, but will pass by a very
great vote. An attack is made on what is called the Toussaint's clause,
the object of which, as is charged by the one party and admitted by the
other, is to facilitate the separation of the island from France.
The clause will pass, however, by about nineteen to eight, or perhaps
eighteen to nine. Rigaud, at the head of the people of color, maintains
his allegiance. But they are only twenty-five thousand souls, against
five hundred thousand, the number of the blacks. The treaty made with
them by Maitland is (if they are to be separated from France) the best
thing for us. They must get their provisions from us. It will indeed be
in English bottoms, so that we shall lose the carriage. But the English
will probably forbid them the ocean, confine them to their island, and
thus prevent their becoming an American Algiers. It must be admitted,
too, that they may play them off on us when they please. Against this
there is no remedy but timely measures on our part, to clear ourselves,
by degrees, of the matter on which that lever can work.

*****

A p