John Langdon thanks Jefferson for the present he gave his daughter

December 7, 1785, John Langdon to Jefferson, Portsmouth (NH): “Our dear Bets, begs leave to present you with her grateful thanks, for the great honor you have been pleased to confer on her, in sending such an agreeable present: all Companies who come into the house must be entertained with the sight of her doll, and tumbling Gentleman; and she does not fail to confess her obligations to Governor Jefferson.

  “Mrs. Langdon desires her most kind respects may be made acceptable to you and your agreeable daughter.” [Boyd, Papers of Thomas Jefferson, 9:84-85]  

Langdon was the governor of New Hampshire, and wealthiest resident of Portsmouth. Jefferson visited on a side trip on his way to Boston before sailing for his diplomatic post in Paris in 1784. 

Oran-ootan

"The first difference which strikes us is that of colour....And is this difference of no importance? Is it not the foundation of a greater or less share of beauty in the two races? Are not the fine mixtures of red and white, the expressions of every passion by greater or less suffusions of colour in the one, preferable to that eternal monotony, which reigns in the countenances, that immoveable veil of black which covers all the emotions of the other race? Add to these, flowing hair, a more elegant symmetry of form, their own judgment in favour of the whites, declared by their preference of them as uniformly as is the preference of the Oran-ootan for the black women over those of his own species." Notes on the State of Virginia (1785), 252-253

Thomas Jefferson to Maria Cosway, Paris, 14 January 1789

"How have you weathered this rigorous season, my dear friend? Surely it was never so cold before. To me who am an animal of a warm climate, a mere Oran-ootan, it has been a severe trial."