xi. SINCLAIR,
Sir John.
Introductory Observations, pointing out some additional measures, submitted to the Consideration of the Board of Agriculture.
By Sir John Sinclair, Bart. President of the Board.
[
London:
B. McMillan,
1807.]
2 leaves, caption title, printer’s imprint at the end.
Signed at the end:
John Sinclair, Board of Agriculture, 1st August, 1807.
Presentation copy from Sir. John Sinclair, sent from London on August 13, 1807: “Sir John Sinclair presents his compliments, and tho’ much hurried, preparing to set out for Scotland, yet having so favourable
an opportunity of sending Letters to America, as by means of Mr. Medford, he cannot deny himself the pleasure of transmitting
to his friends there, Copies of the prospectus of his Code of Health, and Longevity, and of his introductory observations
to a work on Enclosures, pointing out the additional measures, in the contemplation of the Board of Agriculture, for the improvement
of this Country.
"He hopes it will prove of some service to the rising Empire of America to have the useful knowledge of the Mother Country,
thus collected, and digested. The Americans will, in that case, have only to improve on the foundaiton, that has been laid,
and Europe in its turn, must derive much benefit, from the new discoveries, which the genius and talents of America will necessarily
produce . . .”
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xii.
Programme des Prix remis et proposés, et Notice des Médailles d’Encouragement données par La Société d’Agriculture du Département
de la Seine, dans sa Séance publique du Dimanche 1
er. Mai 1808.
[A
Paris: de l’Imprimerie de Mme
Huzard, Imprimeur de la Société d’Agriculture] [
1808].
8vo. 2 parts in 1, 55 leaves: A-G
7 in eights, half-title only at the beginning, printer’s imprint at the end; each part signed at the end
Chassiron, President, Silvestre, Sécrétaire. The
Notice de la Distribution des Medailles begins on F
i verso.
Silvestre at different times sent to Jefferson (through David Baillie Warden) a number of pamphlets from the Société d’Agriculture
du departement de la Seine.
Jefferson received from the Société a Gold Medal for his invention of a “Mould board of least resistence”, and on May 29,
1807, he wrote to Silvestre: “
I have recieved through the care of Gen
l .Armstrong, the medal of gold by which the society of Agriculture at Paris have been pleased to mark their approbation of
the form of a mouldboard which I had proposed; also the four first volumes of their Memoirs, and the information that they
had honoured me with the title of foreign associate to their society. I recieve with great thankfulness these testimonies
of their favour, and should be happy to merit them by greater services. attached to agriculture by inclination as well as
by a conviction that it is the most useful of the occupations of man, my course of life has not permitted me to add to it’s
theories the lessons of practice . . .
”
On October 21, David Baillie Warden wrote to Jefferson concerning this award: “. . . the mould board, for which you obtained the Prize, has been pronounced by the Abbé Hauy, and others, to be Mathematically
exact, and incapable of farther improvement.”
Jefferson designed and made this mould board in 1794, and in 1798 wrote a complete description of it, with illustrations, to Sir John Sinclair of the London Board of Agriculture.
The Library of Congress has a copy of a broadside headed: A Supplementary note on the mould board described in a letter to Sir John Sinclair, of March 23, 1798, inserted in the American Philosophical Transactions, vol. 4, and in Maese's Domestic Encyclopedia voce Plough,1 column, with a woodcut illustration, and the printed signature Th: Jefferson at the foot. This copy is endorsed in ink, not in Jefferson’s handwriting: entd. Th: Jefferson, Feb. 1805. See Evans 3394, who locates this copy only.
Jefferson mentioned this mouldboard in a letter to the comte de Volney in Paris, dated from Washington, February 11, 1806 (LC 27398): ". . . annually a newspaper paragraph tells me, with some details, that the society of agriculture of Paris had thought a mould board of my construction worthy their notice, & mr Dupont confirms it in a letter, but not specifying anything particular. I send him a model with an advantageous change in the form, in which however the principle is rigorously the same. I mention this to you lest he should have left France for America and I notice it no otherwise lest there should have been any error in the information.
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xiii. SILVESTRE, [
Augustin François, BAron de].
Rapport sur les Travaux de la Société d’Agriculture du Département de la Seine Pendant l’année 1808; Par M. Silvestre, Secrétaire de la Société, Membre
