The appearance of the PrC suggests that TJ letterpressed two separate documents onto one sheet: on the bottom, the brief message to Monroe, and on the top, the text rendered in code as TJ intended to send it. As decoded, allowing for interchangeability of i and j and of u and v, the message would read: “tho mas je fer son to ja mes mon ro june 5 eighteen hundred three this can is ter of te a is for my fri end mad dam de cor ny I ad dre s it to you for del iv ery because it may be pro hi bit ed it go es to an other port to fin d a convey ance therefore no letter to her ac com pa ni es it ad ie u.” The code was one that Madison sent to Monroe in February 1803 before Monroe departed for France. Madison and Monroe used it in their diplomatic correspondence, and various U.S. diplomats and agents employed it until 1866. Robert R. Livingston did not adopt the code and continued to use the one he had taken with him to France (Madison, Papers description begins William T. Hutchinson, Robert A. Rutland, J. C. A. Stagg, and others, eds., The Papers of James Madison, Chicago and Charlottesville, 1962- , 35 vols., Sec. of State Ser., 1986- , 9 vols., Pres. Ser., 1984- , 7 vols., Ret. Ser., 2009- , 2 vols. description ends , Sec. of State Ser., 4:352; Weber, United States Diplomatic Codes description begins Ralph E. Weber, United States Diplomatic Codes and Ciphers, 1775–1938, Chicago, 1979 description ends , 154–7, 185–8, 201, 203, 207–10, 216–19, 478–89).

Madame de corny asked TJ to send her some tea in her letter of 15 Feb., which reached TJ on 2 May. He had already acquired the canister of “fine tea” before he received her request. Despite his intention to send it to her in June, he did not find a conveyance until November, when the schooner Citizen departed on a transatlantic voyage on public service, carrying gun carriages to Morocco and stopping along the way at L’Orient to deliver the ratification of the Louisiana Purchase treaty. The tea reached a delighted and grateful Madame de Corny by early February 1804 (Madison, Papers description begins William T. Hutchinson, Robert A. Rutland, J. C. A. Stagg, and others, eds., The Papers of James Madison, Chicago and Charlottesville, 1962- , 35 vols., Sec. of State Ser., 1986- , 9 vols., Pres. Ser., 1984- , 7 vols., Ret. Ser., 2009- , 2 vols. description ends , Sec. of State Ser., 5:593; NDBW description begins Dudley W. Knox, ed., Naval Documents Related to the United States Wars with the Barbary Powers, Washington, D.C., 1939–44, 6 vols. and Register of Officer Personnel and Ships’ Data, 1801–1807, Washington, D.C., 1945 description ends , 3:297; TJ to Madame de Corny, 1 Nov. 1803; TJ to Livingston, 4 Nov.; Livingston to TJ, 11 Jan. 1804; Madame de Corny to TJ, 2 Feb.).