RC (DLC); at head of text: “Thomas Jefferson Esq”; endorsed by TJ as received 2 Feb. 1812 and so recorded in SJL. Enclosures: (1) Melish, Proposal to Publish by Subscription his new work entitled Travels in the United States of America, in the Years 1806 & 1807, and 1809, 1810, & 1811; including an account of passages betwixt America and Britain, and Travels through Various Parts of Britain, Ireland, and Upper Canada, 2 vols. (Philadelphia, 1812; Sowerby, description begins E. Millicent Sowerby, comp., Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson, 1952–59, 5 vols. description ends no. 4034), to be published in octavo for $5 in boards, and to include a full account of his travels and the results of his extensive interviews with local inhabitants, as well as maps, plates, and appendices reviewing the existing geographical and travel literature, summarizing the United States Constitution, and providing statistical information and documents important to an understanding of political economy; noting that during his travels he had observed the impact of “the stoppage of the foreign trade” on the maritime states and come to believe that “internal manufacture and commerce would, in all probability, be substituted for foreign commerce” in the near future; and observing that as a result the western states were now “a most important field for inquiry,” thanks to their fertile soil, moderate climate, natural resources, sparse population, and abundance of cheap land, which made them both a likely source of industrial strength and an expanding market for eastern manufactures (undated broadside in DLC: TJ Papers, 192:34219). (2) Melish, Outlines of Travels in the United States … Plan of the Work, detailing the subjects to be covered in each of more than one hundred chapters (with chapter 31 of the first volume to describe his visit to TJ at the President’s House in Washington, where he got a “Polite reception, and information as to the state of the country, Roads, Bridges, Canals, Manufactures, Health, &c”) and in appendices (undated pamphlet in DLC: TJ Papers, 192:34215–8).