“ the favor of you to desire the printer, when the work is compleat, to send me thirteen copies, 3 of them neatly bound, the rest in boards (for transmission to Europe) the best conveyance is by the stage, addressed to Gibson & Jefferson, merchants of that place, who will pay the transportation and forward them to me. they would be still safer, if any passenger to Richmond would take them under his care. the amount shall be remitted on reciept of the printer’s bill. ”

On the same day he wrote to Nicholas Biddle: “ In a letter from m( ^~ r) Paul Allen of Philadelphia, I was informed that other business had obliged you to turn over to him the publication of Gov ^r. Lewis’s journal of his Western expedition: and he requested me to furnish him with any materials I could for writing a sketch of his life. I now inclose him such as I have been able to procure, to be used with any other information he may have recieved, or alone, if he has no other, or in any way you & he shall think proper. the part you have been so good as to take in digesting the work entitles you to decide on whatever may be proposed to go out under it’s auspices; and on this ground I take the liberty of putting under cover to you, and for your perusal, my letter to m ( ^~ r) Allen, which I will request you to seal & hand on to him. I am happy in this occasion of expressing my portion of the thanks all will owe you for the trouble you have taken with this interesting narrative, and the assurance of my sentiments of high esteem and respect. ”

Biddle replied to this from Andalusia on the Delaware on September 28: “My residence in the country during the summer has prevented me from answering sooner your very polite note of the 20 ^th of August covering a communication to M ^r Allen which was immediately transmitted to him. It is now a long time since I was tempted by the request of Gen ^l Clark & other friends as well as by the natural interest of the subject to undertake the composition of the narrative part of the travels of Mess ^rs Lewis & Clark, whilst D ^r Barton took charge of the objects of natural history connected with the work. I had written off roughly nearly the whole when other occupations interposed, and on Gen ^l Clark’s visit here last spring I gave up the manuscripts to M ^r Allen, who was to take the rude outline as I had left it, add from the original journals whatever had been omitted in the first rapid sketch, mould the whole as he thought best and superintend the publication. He informs me that about one half of the second & last volume of the narrative is printed & that the whole will appear shortly. The introductory notice of Gov ^r Lewis is very interesting and the account of the previous projects for exploring the country west of the Mississipi contains new & curious information. You mention the assistance of the Baron de Grimm--you may not perhaps have seen the correspondence of that gentleman which was published last year at Paris . . .”

On December 6, in a letter to Von Humboldt in Paris, Jefferson wrote: “ . . . You will find it inconceivable that Lewis’s journey to the Pacific should not yet have appeared, nor is it in my power to tell you the reason. the measures taken by his surviving companion Clarke, for the publication, have not answered our wishes in point of dispatch. I think however, from what I have heard, that the mere journal will be out within a few weeks in 2. vols. 8 ^vo. these I will take care to send you with the tobacco seed you desired, if it be possible for them to escape the thousand ships of our enemies spread over the ocean. the botanical & zoological discoveries of Lewis will probably experience greater delay, and become known to the world thro other channels before that volume will be ready. the Atlas, I believe, waits on the leisure of the engraver . . . ”

On December 18, Paul Allen wrote to Jefferson: “I trust that Your Excellency will do me the justice to believe that your request with regard to the volumes of Lewis & Clarke would have been complied with long since & the books transmitted if the work had not been unexpectedly detained in the hands of the Printer. They have now arrived at the conclusion of the work excepting the diary of the weather &c which comes in at the appendix. The delay has been occa- ”