When I received your letter, the time of my departure was too near to
permit me to obtain information from Constantinople, relative to the
demand and price of rice there. I therefore wrote to a merchant at
Marseilles, concerned in the Levant trade, for the prices current of
rice at Constantinople and at Marseilles for several years past. He has
sent me only the present price at Marseilles, and that of a particular
cargo at Constantinople. I send you a copy of his letter. The Algerines
form an obstacle; but the object of our commerce in the Mediterranean
is so immense, that we ought to surmount that obstacle, and I believe
it could be done by means in our power, and which, instead of fouling us
with the dishonorable and criminal baseness of France and England, will
place us in the road to respect with all the world.

I have obtained, and enclose to you, a state of all the rice imported
into this country in the course of one year, which shows its annual
consumption to be between eighty-one and eighty-two thousand quintals.
I think you may supplant all the other furnishing States, except as to
what is consumed at Marseilles and its neighborhood. In fact, Paris is
the place of main consumption. Havre, therefore, is the port of deposit,
where you ought to have one or two honest, intelligent, and active
consignees. The ill success of a first or second experiment should not
damp the endeavors to open this market fully, but the obstacles should
be forced by perseverance. I have obtained, from different quarters,
seeds of the dry rice; but having had time to try them, I find they
will not vegetate, having been too long kept. I have still several other
expectations from the East Indies. If this rice be as good, the object
of health will render it worth experiment with you. Cotton is a precious
resource, and which cannot fail with you. I wish the cargo of olive
plants sent by the way of Baltimore, and that which you will perceive my
correspondent is preparing now to send, may arrive to you in good order.