1From John Jay to Timothy Pickering, 24 December 1808 (Jay Papers)
Accept my thanks for your friendly Letter of the 10 th . Inst: and for the Papers which you was so obliging to send me; and which I assure you did not “intrude on my Retirement”. When I withdrew from public Life, I carried with me the same cordial attachment to the Honor and Welfare of our Country, by which I had uniformly been activated. From early Youth it was my Desire and Intention to live...