In his Notes on Virginia Jefferson describes the book as a large octavo volume of small print, and the author as a man of classical learning, and very exact, but of no taste in style. He is inelegant therefore, and his details often too minute to be tolerable even to a native of the country, whose history he writes.

William Stith, 1707-1755, was the third President of William and Mary College. This book brings the history of Virginia to 1624, and is still one of the standard works on the history of that colony.

Contemporary sheep, vol. I with the Library of Congress 1815 bookplate. Each volume is initialled by Jefferson at sigs. I and T and there are several corrections in ink by him. Some passages marked in pencil, and marginal notes in vol. I are signed R.R.

This book is dedicated to Thomas Jefferson, from whom the author borrowed source material for the second volume, and to whom he originally wrote concerning this material on February 2, 1803, from Petersburg, Virginia: “I am employed in writing an history of Virginia. My contract is made; the Subscription fills beyond my expectations and I shall doubtless receive the stipulated sum, whether the work be excellent or otherwise: but my pride and my principles instruct me, that something more is expected from me; that it is my duty to make my book, as far as my opportunities will admit, correct and interesting. In the commencement of an undertaking so arduous and important, I naturally turn my eyes to you, for aid and advice: you must, judging from the habits of your life & your particular pursuits, possess many valuable materials for such a work; and you, above all men know how to appreciate a faithfull history of your own state. I ask, in full confidence of receiving it, the aid of your experience & Information & solicit your permission to send you a copy of the work previous to its publication.”

Jefferson replied from Washington on February 21: “ Your favor of the 2 ^d. has been duly recieved. in the early part of my life I paid a good deal of attention to the state papers of Virginia, and in some degree to those of the other states. the result of my enquiries is contained in the list of statepapers at the end of the Notes on Virginia, and so far as I possessed any of these papers they were communicated to m ( ^~r ) Hazard to be published in his Collection of statepapers. independent of these I possess a tolerably compleat set of the printed laws of Virginia. this being the only set in existence, (for they are lost from the offices) and being now resorted to from all parts of the state as the only resource for laws not to be found in the late publications, I have been obliged to decline letting the volumes go out of my possession further than Milton or Charlottesville, because the loss of a volume would be irreparable . . . I possess also a file of Virginia newspapers from about 1733 to about 1775. these are all the materials in my possession, and to a free use of which you shall be perfectly welcome, & to every other service I can render to your undertaking, to which I ask leave to become one of the subscribers . . . ”

On May 26, 1805, after the publication of Volume I, Burk wrote from Battersea near Petersburg to Jefferson: “The file of newspapers and the collection of the old laws of this commonwealth, which under ”