LETTER 



FROM PETER S. Du PONCEAU TO THE HON. ANDREW STE- 

 VENSON, SPEAKER OF THE HOOSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

 OF THE UNITED STATES. 



Washington 8th May, 1832. 



SIR : The present session of Congress being far advan- 

 ced, and business pressing on your honorable House from 

 every side, I think it my duty to solicit again their atten- 

 tion to the bill ' for promoting the growth and manufac- 

 ture of silk,' now pending before them, and to state some 

 reasons why it is important to the nation that it should 

 be acted upon as soon as possible, and, above all things, 

 that it should not be suffered to go over the present session. 



As there are many members of the present House who 

 are unacquainted with the history of this bill, and who 

 may not understand on what grounds I take the liberty 

 to address them through you, I beg leave to give here a 

 brief statement of it, which, while it serves as my apology, 

 will, I believe, throw some additional light on the impor- 

 tant subject to which your attention is most respectfully 

 requested. 



When, at the beginning of the first session of the last 

 Congress, I had the honor to present to them a copy of the 

 'Essays on American Silk,' then lately published by Mr 

 D'Homergue and myself,! had nothing in view but to give 

 them a mark of my profound respect, and, at the same time, 

 through them, to extend the knowledge of the facts 

 which the book contains. I was highly flattered by the 

 honor which the House did to that little work, by refer- 

 ing it to their committee on agriculture ; still, I had no 

 idea that that would lead to the recommendation of a 

 legislative measure. 



The idea of deriving a national advantage from the ex- 

 portation of raw silk was entirely new, at that time, in 

 the United States. Until then, the culture of that rich 

 production of our soil had been considered only with a 

 view to domestic manufactures. This is so true, that, in 



