In his record of miscellaneous circumstances, Jefferson did not say what this whale meant to him, but he was becoming fascinated with what it could mean to the United States. During his journey through New England, he recognized the commercial potential of the whaling industry. “Notes on Commerce of the Northern States” contains numerous references to the state of American whaling. In Paris, Jefferson would take an active interest in the whale fishery, especially when it came to its place in trade relations between the United States and Europe. The sperm whale particularly interested him. “An active, fierce animal,” he called it, one that required “vast address and boldness in the fisherman.”2 This extract comes from Observations on the Whale-Fishery, the brilliant pamphlet Jefferson would present to the French foreign ministry a few years later. Encouraging the French to patronize the American whaling industry, Jefferson would argue persuasively that the exclusion of American whale oil from the French market worked counter to French interests.3
The voyage gave him time for reading, and he spent a good part of that time teaching himself Spanish, a fairly simple task according to the story he later told John Quincy Adams. Upon hearing Jefferson’s story, Adams recorded in his diary that Jefferson had taught himself Spanish “with the help of a Don Quixote lent him by Mr. Cabot, and a grammar, in the course of a passage to Europe, on which he was but nineteen days at sea. But,” young Adams added, “Mr. Jefferson tells large stories.’4 Jefferson’s personal correspondence reveals his fondness for hyperbole; Adams’s remark suggests that Jefferson also had a reputation for tall talk, an aspect of his character that history has obscured. If there is anything suspicious about what Jefferson told John Quincy Adams, then it is his assertion that he learned the language at this time. Other evidence suggests a prior familiarity with Spanish. Recall what James Duane had told John Adams the previous decade: Spanish was one of several languages Jefferson already knew.
When it comes to the story of his reading aboard the Ceres, much additional evidence supports what Jefferson told John Quincy Adams. Embarking on a diplomatic mission overseas, he understood the importance of knowing Spanish. He told Peter Carr that the diplomatic connection between the United States and Spain was making Spanish “the most necessary of the modern languages after the French.”5 The books he acquired from James Rivington’s New York bookstore the week he spent in New York included a Spanish dictionary. Apparently unable to purchase a copy of Don Quixote in the original before leaving Boston, Jefferson borrowed a two-volume Spanish edition from a member of Boston’s prominent Cabot family and agreed to send it back with the Ceres when the ship returned to Boston. In his letter of thanks to Mr. Cabot, which has only recently come to light, Jefferson wrote, “I deliver to Mr. Tracy to be returned to you the copy of Don Quixot which you were so obliging as to lend me: for which I return you many thanks. The winds have been so propitious as to let me get through one volume only: yet this has so far done away the difficulties of the language as that I shall be able to pursue it on shore with pleasure. I have found it a very advantageous disposal of time which could have been applied to no other use, and would have hung heavily on my hands.”6
This letter reconciles the varying accounts of Jefferson’s knowledge of Spanish. Mentioning that he had some difficulties with Spanish suggests that he had studied it beforehand but had not mastered it completely. In other words, when he met Duane in 1775, Jefferson knew the rudiments of Spanish. During this voyage, he refreshed his knowledge by rereading Don Quixote with his new dictionary nearby. Presumably, Martha had her French edition of Don Quixote handy during the trip, so her father could have consulted the French text whenever he wished to double-check his Spanish. Picture father and daughter aboard ship leisurely sunning themselves on the deck of the Ceres, reading Don Quixote side by side.
Jefferson understood that reading a familiar text in an unfamiliar language facilitated the language-learning process. Having read Don Quixote in French during his youth, he found the Spanish text relatively easy to read, so much so that he boasted about it to John Quincy Adams. He continued to hone his knowledge of the language in Paris, where he purchased separate French and Spanish editions of Fénelon’s Adventures of Telemachus and, as he sometimes did with editions of foreign language texts, conflated them, that is, had one edition interleaved and bound together with the other. Reading Telemachus in a French/Spanish parallel text in Paris, Jefferson continued to improve his knowledge of Spanish.
After two weeks aboard ship, they began seeing more and more vessels coming from the opposite direction. At ten o’clock Saturday evening, July 24, they passed the lighthouse at Scilly. From here, the possibility of dispatching letters arose; several of Jefferson’s letters from this date are headed “On board the Ceres off Scilly.” In one, he informed John Adams that he was looking for a vessel to take them directly to France. Such was not to be the case. The weather was thick as they approached the coast of Europe, and they encountered no other vessels that could take them to the French coast.
They proceeded through the English Channel as far as the Isle of Wight, where they landed at Cowes that Monday. Despite the last-minute fog, the crossing had turned out to be what few ocean crossings were in Jefferson’s day: pleasant and expedient. The rugged weather the stormy petrels had foretold had not come to pass. So much for superstition. Throughout the journey, the winds were favorable and the route direct.
Martha’s correspondence shows how pleasant the crossing was. In a letter to her Philadelphia friend Eliza Trist, which forms the fullest account of their voyage, she wrote, “We had a lovely passage in a beautiful new ship that had only made one voyage before. There were only six passengers, all of whom papa knew, and a fine sun shine all the way, with the sea which was as calm as a river. I should have no objection at making an other voyage if I could be sure it would be as agreable as the first. We landed in England where we made a very short stay.”7
Writing to her friend, Martha did not say why they decided to spend a few days in England, but her father, describing the journey to Monroe, told him that she had come down with a fever shortly before they reached Cowes. Consequently, he decided to remain in England until she recuperated. The day after landing, they took the ferry to Portsmouth. A busy seaport and home to the British navy, Portsmouth made a handsome appearance when approached from the sea, crowded as it was with towers and spires and roofs all jumbled together. Here, they found lodgings at the Crown Inn. Jefferson sought the best medical help for Martha he could, which he found in the person of Dr. Thomas Meik, physician to the military garrison at Portsmouth. He also hired a nurse to care for his daughter.8
Having placed Martha in good hands, he lingered nearby until her recovery was certain. Allowing her an additional day to recuperate, he decided to take an excursion into the English countryside. From Dr. Meik he had learned that a mutual friend, Elizabeth Blair Thompson, lived in nearby Titchfield. The opportunity of seeing her gave him an excuse for this side trip. The two had been part of the same social circle during their Williamsburg days, and he “recollected with infinite sensibility” the happy times he had passed in her company.9 In 1769, she had married Samuel Thompson, a captain in the Royal Navy, and the couple settled at Titchfield, where Captain Thompson could live within easy reach of naval headquarters at Portsmouth.
This brief sojourn represents Jefferson’s personal introduction to England. He had no previous firsthand knowledge of local traveling customs. What he knew about traveling the English countryside came through reading such spirited novels as Tom Jones. Given what transpired over the course of the day he visited Titchfield, his personal experience could easily form a chapter in a picaresque English novel: “A curious adventure, during which our hero is prevented from seeing an old friend by the absence of her husband and the poor judgment of her thick-headed maid-servant.”
From Portsmouth, he took the road that looped around the northern shore of the harbor through Fareham to Titchfield, where he called at the Thompso
n home. One of Mrs. Thompson’s servants answered the door and informed him that her mistress was not at home. Though disappointed, Jefferson accepted what the servant had to say and left the Thompson home without seeing his old friend. But the servant had misled the distinguished American visitor. Mrs. Thompson was home, but she was confined to her bedroom, having just lost her baby. Since Captain Thompson was away, the servant thought it best to tell the stranger that the mistress of the house was not at home, seeing it would be inappropriate to let an unaccompanied gentleman into her private chambers, especially during this time of mourning. Disappointed, Jefferson left Titchfield and proceeded toward Gosport, where he could catch the ferry back to Portsmouth.
After sending him off, the servant proceeded upstairs to tell Mrs. Thompson who had called. The news that her old Virginia friend Tom Jefferson, whom she had not seen for many years, had visited and that the servant had sent him away severely mortified Elizabeth. “My stupid servant,” she wrote in an apologetic letter to him, “ought to have told you that I was confined up stairs with a little one, (I had just lost,) instead of saying I was not at home.” She continued, “Had I known you was in the house, I should not have denyed my self the pleasure of seeing you, and should certainly have interduced you into my Bed Chamber…. I don’t know that I was ever more vexed, for believe me I should have rejoyced much to see you.”10 The next day, she dispatched her husband to meet Jefferson at Portsmouth. Captain Thompson’s efforts were in vain. A fair wind beckoned, and Jefferson, his daughter, and his coachman were already on their way across the channel by the time the captain reached Portsmouth.
This overnight channel crossing was much less pleasant than their ocean crossing had been. The windowless cabin Jefferson shared with his daughter was dark and confining. “It rained violently,” she recalled, “and the sea was exceedingly rough all the time.”11 Their ship set off from England at six o’clock that evening but did not reach Le Havre de Grace until seven the next morning.
Entering France, Jefferson was in for a rude awakening. Though he prided himself on his ability to read French and had spent much of his spare time in Annapolis doing so, he quickly realized that his knowledge of Montaigne and Montesquieu did him little good when it came to making travel arrangements from Le Havre to Paris. His letters say little about the difficulties in communication they encountered. His daughter was more frank. To Eliza Trist, she wrote, “I fear we should have fared as badly at our arival [as on the cramped and stormy voyage] for papa spoke very little french and me not a word, if an Irish gentleman, an entire stranger to us, who seeing our embarrassment, had not been so good as to conduct us to a house and was of great service to us.”12
They spent two days at Le Havre arranging the final leg of their journey to Paris. The route took them along the Seine, bringing them through what Martha called “the most beautiful country I ever saw in my life.”13 Riding in their elegant Virginia phaeton, they were using a mode of travel that surprised and amazed French countryfolk wherever they stopped. Most took the phaeton to be the contrivance of a wealthy gentleman: every time they stopped to change horses, they were accosted by beggars, an experience virtually unheard of in Virginia.
From Le Havre, they passed through Rouen, Mantes, and Marly. They paused at each place to view the local architectural wonders. At Rouen they saw what Martha described as “a church built by William the conqueror.” At Mantes, they visited the twelfth-century church of Notre Dame, which, as Martha said, “had as many steps to go to the top as there are days in the year.” Lingering at this cathedral, they enjoyed the statues, the architecture, and the spectacular stained glass. At Marly, they viewed the intricate ironworks that supplied water to the fountains of the royal pleasure gardens. Marly was one of the great tourist destinations of the age, and Jefferson would make his way back there again.
“Behold me at length on the vaunted scene of Europe!” he exclaimed in a letter to Carlo Bellini once he entered the gates of Paris and settled himself within its walls.14 His words suggest that he entered the city with a sense of grandeur, but the true story of his arrival casts him as an innocent abroad. Arriving in Paris, they checked into the Hôtel d’Orléans on the Rue de Richelieu—without realizing that there were two hotels of that name within the walls of Paris. Jefferson had checked into the wrong one. A few days later he remedied the error and relocated to the Hôtel d’Orléans on the Left Bank.
The first order of business was to get himself and his daughter properly attired for Paris. He also wanted to see Franklin as soon as possible, and he looked forward to renewing his friendship with the Marquis de Chastellux, who would be instrumental in helping to find a school for Martha. In late August, they placed her at Panthemont, an exclusive convent school. Initially, Jefferson was leery about putting her in a Catholic school, but he was assured that many other Protestant girls attended Panthemont and that the school did not make religion a part of its curriculum.
Calling on Franklin within the first few days of his arrival in Paris, Jefferson renewed a friendship that had been firmly cemented in Philadelphia during the mid-1770s. He remembered the keen intellectual conversations they had then and anticipated their renewal. In this, he was not disappointed. Eager for firsthand news of the United States, Franklin listened with great interest to Jefferson about his American odyssey.
The story of his travels offered a helpful corrective to the libels that were filling the British press. As Franklin told Richard Price, “Your Newspapers are full of fictitious Accounts of Distractions in America. We know nothing of them. Mr. Jefferson, just arrived here, after a Journey thro’ all the States from Virginia to Boston, assures me that all is quiet, a general Tranquility reigns, and the People well satisfy’d with their present Forms of Government, a few insignificant Persons only excepted.”15 It is not difficult to imagine what else Franklin and Jefferson discussed during their first meeting in Paris. They talked briefly of their commission and the possibility of signing treaties with other nations, but they could do little in this regard until John Adams, the third member of their commission, reached Paris. They talked of absent friends. And they talked about books.
During his time in Paris, Franklin had expanded his personal library significantly. Besides purchasing many books, he had received numerous others as presents from some of the greatest contemporary thinkers, authors, and scientists in Europe. Jefferson apparently complimented him on his impressive library. Franklin called reading the “greatest of all amusements.” Jefferson agreed. At this time or another, Franklin made a comment Jefferson enjoyed repeating: “Doctr. Franklin used to say that when he was young, and had time to read, he had not books; and now when he had become old and had books, he had no time.”16
Jefferson admired Franklin’s library, but such admiration made him anxious to start visiting the Paris bookstalls and begin adding to his own collection. The advice Franklin offered on the subject was of minimal use to Jefferson, whose approach to book-buying was much different from Franklin’s. Incapacitated by gout and stones, Franklin usually had the books he wanted brought to him. Jefferson, on the other hand, was a great walker. He looked forward to exploring the streets and the bookstalls of Paris on his own.
Franklin’s advice about printers may have been more useful than his advice about booksellers. At his instigation, the Duc de la Rochefoucauld had translated a collection of the constitutions of all thirteen American states, which was published as Constitutions des Treize États-Unis de l’Amérique. To print the work, Franklin had enlisted the services of Philippe-Denys Pierres, whom he regarded highly. Pierres had just the qualifications Jefferson required: he could print English text accurately and cheaply. Before year’s end, Jefferson would make his way to Pierres’s print shop on the Rue Saint-Jacques and arrange with him to print Notes on the State of Virginia.
After relocating to the other Hôtel d’Orléans, Jefferson was drawn to its nearby bookshops. Many excellent ones were located on the Left Bank. The first bookselle
r he patronized was Jean Claude Molini, whose shop was on the Rue Mignon. Specializing in Italian books, Molini imported much of his stock from Italy, but he also published some reprints of classic works of Italian literature, including Tasso’s Aminta and Guarini’s Il Pastor Fido.
Jefferson’s memorandum book makes no mention of what books he bought from Molini the first time he visited his shop, but that year Molini published an edition of Lorenzo Pignotti’s Favole e Novelle, a collection of verse fables satirizing the follies of the time, which Jefferson did add to his library. Aboard the Ceres he had brushed up his Spanish in an effort to improve his qualifications as a diplomat. Now in Paris, he was honing his knowledge of another important modern language. What better way to do so than by reading some humorous topical verse? He later presented the volume to Martha to help her learn Italian.17 Throughout his time in Paris, he would frequently return to the Rue Mignon to acquire additional books from Molini, Italian and otherwise.
Within his first few weeks in Paris, Jefferson met several other booksellers and found one he preferred above the rest, an old gentleman named Jacques François Froullé. Located on the Quai des Augustins, Froullé’s shop was not far from Molini’s. Jefferson sometimes visited both on the same day. During his time in Paris, he developed quite an affection for Froullé. Recommending a Paris bookseller to James Monroe, Jefferson singled out Froullé. After buying many books from him and engaging his help in other literary business, Jefferson concluded that Froullé was “one of the most conscientiously honest men” he had ever encountered.18
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