and that, you know, is inheriting no trifle. Polly grows fast. I should write to Mrs. Skipwith also, but that I rely on your friendship to repeat to her the assurance of my affection for her and Mr. Skipwith. We look forward with impatience to the moment when we may be all reunited, though but for a little time. Kiss your dear children for us, the little and the big, and tender them my warmest affections, accepting yourself assurances of the sincere esteem and attachment, with which I am, my dear Madam, your affectionate and humble servant, TH. JEFFERSON. The long-expected leave of absence came at last, and was received by Jefferson during the last days of August (1789). October being deemed the best month in which to be at sea, he postponed his voyage until that time. He left Paris on the 26th of September, as he thought, to be absent only a few months, but, as the event proved, never to return again. We find in his Memoir the following affectionate farewell to the kind people and the fair land of France: I can not leave this great and good country without expressing my sense of its pre-eminence of character among the nations of the earth. A more benevolent people I have never known, nor greater warmth and devotedness in their select friendships. Their kindness and accommodation to strangers is unparalleled, and the hospitality of Paris is beyond any thing I had conceived to be practicable in a large city. Their eminence, too, in science, the communicative dispositions of their scientific men, the politeness of their general manners, the ease and vivacity of their conversation, give a charm to their society to be found nowhere else. In a comparison of this with other countries, we have the proof of primacy which was given to Themistocles after the battle of Salamis. Every general voted to himself the first reward of valor, and the second to Themistocles. So, ask the travelled inhabitant of any nation, on what country on earth would you rather live?--Certainly in my own, where are all my friends, my relations, and the earliest and sweetest affections and recollections of my life. Which would be your second choice? France. Of Jefferson's discharge of his duties as minister at the Court of St. Germains, Mr. Webster spoke thus: