395
which will give us a vent for that article, paying a duty of a guinea and a half a ton, only.
I have the honor to be, with the highest esteem and respect, Dear Sir,
your most obedient and
most humble servant,
TH: JEFFERSON.
LETTER CXLIX. TO A. CARY.
Paris, January 7, 1786.
DEAR SIR,
The very few of my countrymen who happen to be punc tual, will find their punctuality a misfortune to them. Of this I shall give you a proof, by the present application, which I should not make to you, if I did not know you to be superior to the torpidity of our climate. In my conversations with the Count de Buffon, on the subjects of Natural history, I find him absolutely unacquainted with our elk and our deer. He has hitherto believed, that our deer never had horns more than a foot long ; and has, therefore, classed them with the roe buck, which I am sure, you know them to be different from. I have exam ined some of the red deer of this country, at the distance of about sixty yards, and I find no other difference between them and ours, than a shade or two in the colour. Will you take the trouble to procure for me the largest pair of buck s horns you can, and a large skin of each colour, that is to say, a red and a blue ? If it were possible to take these from a buck just killed, to leave all the bones of the head in the skin, with the horns on, to leave the bones of the legs in the skin also, and the hoofs to it, so that, having only made an incision all along the belly and neck, to take the animal out at, we could, by sewing up that incision, and stuffing the skin, present the true size and form of the animal, it would be a most precious present. Our deer have been often sent to England and Scotland. Do you know (with certainty) whether they have ever bred with the red deer of those countries? With re spect to the elk, I despair of your being able to get for me, any thing but the horns of it. David Ross, I know, has a pair ; perhaps he would give them to us. It is useless to ask for the skin and skele ton, because, I think it not in your power to get them ; otherwise, they would be most desirable. A gentleman, fellow passenger
