From James Madison to William Shaler, 20 April 1826
To William Shaler
Montpellier April 20. 1826
Dear Sir
I have recd. from the publishers in Boston, a copy of your “Sketches of Algiers”;1 forwarded as they intimate by your request.
The work is welcomed by the public here, as it well deserves to be, as a very valuable addition to what was hitherto known of the singular and interesting quarter of which it treats. Your Country gains credit also from the example of such a publication by one of its foreign functionaries.
Be pleased to accept, Sir, my thanks for your polite attention; with my wishes that your opportunities may be continued for pursuing the researches which you turn to such excellent account. I tender you at the same time assurances of my great esteem & my cordial respect.
James Madison
Mrs. Madison charges me with the acknowledgments for which she has long been in arrears; particularly for the token of kind remembrance sent her from Marseilles.2
RC (PHi: William Shaler Papers); draft (DLC). RC addressed by JM to Shaler at Algiers; docketed by Shaler. A note on the cover of the RC in an unidentified hand reads: “Navy Depart: No 345.”
1. William Shaler, Sketches of Algiers, Political, Historical, and Civil: Containing an Account of the Geography, Population, Government, Revenues, Commerce, Agriculture, Arts, Civil Institutions, Tribes, Manners, Languages, and Recent Political History of That Country (Boston, 1826; 26060).
2. For the “token of kind remembrance,” see Shaler to JM, 18 Dec. 1818 and 28 Mar. 1819, , 1:393–94, 442.