strong hold upon the feelings of our people. There are already many flourishing female institutions in our State, such as the Greencastle Female Seminary, under the charge of Mrs. Larrabee and other accomplished assistants, numbering for the past year, one hundred and fifty students, of which number, about ninety were in constant attendance. The Bloomington Female Institution, under the superintendence of Mrs. McPherson, assisted by competent and accomplished young ladies, which also presents a catalogue of eighty or ninety in regular attendance. The Fort Wayne Female College, the Centreville Female Seminary, the St. Mary's Seminary, Indianapolis, and St. Mary of the Woods, Vigo County, all of which are in successful operation, besides the Princeton and New Albany Female Seminaries, with others that are in process of organization. The time will soon arrive when the fair daughters of Indiana will be enabled to acquire, within the borders of their own native State, an education which will place them in favorable comparison with those of the most highly favored portions of our country. However gratifying it may be to witness the rapid advancement of a portion of our population in the higher branches of the Arts and Sciences, there is yet another subject which attracts our attention by its greater importance. I allude to the subject of Free Common Schools, in which the masses of the people are more immediately and vitally interested; it is upon them that our country mainly relies for her permanent peace and prosperity, and it is to their advancement and improvement in knowledge that our legislative action should be mainly directed.

It is a favorite axiom of our republican creed, that all our citizens are politically equal. To enable the citizen to enjoy the rights and privileges granted to him by our constitution, it is necessary that he should receive at least a good elementary English education; if he has this, he is capable of understanding the tendency and bearing of all political questions which are brought forward for public discussion-he is capable of appreciating his rights and maintaining them he can analyze public measures, examine into the conduct of public men, and hold them to strict accountability.

An act was passed at the last General Assembly, the object of which was to increase and extend the benefits of Free Common Schools to the children of the State. Many of the counties, by a vote of the people, adopted this law, and it is to be hoped that in a very short time, there will not be a county in the State, whose citizens will refuse to avail themselves of the benefits of this measure. Doubtless there are many imperfections in the law which will have to be remedied by time and experience, yet it answers as a basis upon which to rear a noble superstructure which will shed its benign influences over all the children of this great and growing young State. When we contemplate the magnitude of this subject in all its varied bearings upon the welfare of the rising generation and upon the perpetuity of that republican form of government, which cost the richest and best blood of the conscript fathers of the

revolution, it seems to me that no representative of the people in this enlightened age will assume upon himself the solemn and fearful responsibility of refusing the means of support to a well digested system of Free Common Schools, thereby closing the door to the diffusion of light and knowledge.

The Temperance cause is one which is deeply agitating the public mind. Whilst I cannot subscribe to all the ultra views advanced by some of the advocates of this great and glorious cause a cause which ultimately every good man in the community is bound to sustain-yet I earnestly invite your attention to the subject and recommend that you enact such stringent laws, for the prevention of the sale of ardent spirits, as will arrest the vice of drunkenness, which stalks over the fairest portion of our country with a worse than pestilential march.

In conclusion, Gentlemen, permit me to recommend a cordial cooperation between my worthy successor and the legislative department of the government, in the enactment of such laws as are best calculated to promote the public welfare and especially the great and important measures of temperance, morality, and education.

Trusting that your deliberations will be characterized by moderation and wisdom, I commend you to the guidance of an all wise Providence, with my fervent wishes for the success of the great and vitally important measures, upon which you are called to deliberate. PARIS C. DUNNING.

DECEMBER 4, 1849.

WASHINGTON'S

FAREWELL ADDRESS,

TO THE

PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES.

SEPTEMBER 17, 1796.

(APPENDED TO THE GOVERNOR'S MESSAGE ACCORDING TO A LAW OF 1846.)

FRIENDS AND FELLOW CITIZENS:

The period for a new election of a citizen to administer the executive government of the United States, being not far distant, and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now apprize you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be made.

I beg you, at the same time, to do me the justice to be assured, that this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the considerations appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful citizen to his country; and that, in withdrawing the tender of service, which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no diminution of zeal for your future interest-no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness; but am supported by a full conviction that the step is compatible with both.

The acceptance of, and a continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice called me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty, and to a deference to what appeared to be your desire. I constantly hoped that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently with motives which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement from

which I have been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an address to declare it to you; but mature reflection on the then perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me to abandon the idea.

I rejoice that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of duty or propriety; and am persuaded, whatever partiality may be retained for my services, that, in the present circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove my determination to retire.

The impressions with which I first undertook the arduous trust, were explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust, I will only say, that I have, with good intentions, contributed towards the organization and administration of the government the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not unconscious, in the outset, of the inferiority of my qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence to myself; and every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more that the shade of retirement is as necessary for me as it will be welcome. Satisfied that if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe, that while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.

In looking forward to the moment which is intended to terminate the career of my public life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the deep acknowledgment of that debt of gratitude which I owe to my beloved country for the many honors it has conferred upon me; still more for the steadfast confidence with which it has supported me; and for the opportunities I have thence enjoyed, of manifesting my inviolable attachment, by services faithful and persevering, though in usefulness unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted to our country from these services, let it always be remembered to your praise, and as an instructive example in our annals, that, under circumstances in which the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead, amidst appearances sometimes dubious, vicissitudes of fortune, often discouraging in situations in which, not unfrequently, want of success has countenanced the spirit of criticism, the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected. Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall carry it with me to my grave, as a strong excitement to unceasing vows, that Heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence; that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free constitution, which is the work of your hands, may, be sacredly maintained; that its administration, in every department, may be stamped with wisdom and virtue; that, in fine, the happiness of the people of these

States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete by so careful a preservation, and so prudent a use of this blessing, as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection, and the adoption of every nation which is yet a stranger to it.

Here, perhaps, I ought to stop; but a solicitude for your welfare, which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn contemplation, and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments, which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and which appear to me all important to the permanency of your felicity as a people. These will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsel; nor can I forget, as an encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a former and not dissimilar occasion.

Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attachment.

The unity of government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence; the support of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very liberty which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken, in your minds, the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can, in any event, be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have, in a common cause, fought and triumphed together; the independ