Superadded to this, there has ever existed a great difficulty, if not an impossibility, in obtaining access to the documents, papers, &c., so valuable in illustrating our history, and which, if sought for, have eluded research from the want of that legislative sanction and authority now desired by your memorialists. " Impressed with these considerations, and encouraged by the counsel and inuflence of the most distinguished of our citizens, the petitioners represent that they are desirous to obtain

^ GENERAL INTRODUCTION.

the passage of a law by this Legislature, authorizing the appointment of an Agent to visit Europe, and, under the sanction of legislative enactment, to transcribe the documentary papers there to be found, having reference to the history of this State. They further represent that they have been advised by many, high in official stations, that there are great numbers of letters, records and official documents in England, Holland and France, detailing the particulars

of our primitive and Revolutionary history, and those relating to public and private negotiations, to distinguished individuals and influential associations, to the plans of foreign governments in their treatment of the Colonies, to the character of our people, and to the nature and resources of our arts and arms. And it is also represented, with like truth and force, as your committee believe, that at no period of our history have circumstances been so auspicious for the prosecution and successful issue of their purposes as those presented at this time. Not only are the relations between the governments referred to and our own more intimate and better understood than heretofore, but the increased facilities of intercommunication, and the mutual dependencies of trade, and reciprocity of public and private favors are such as to render the present truly propitious for the execution of the designs contemplated by the memorialists.