Since the dangerous fever I had in Amsterdam, 2. years ago, I have never enjoyed my health:2 Thro’ the whole of the last Winter & Spring I have suffered under weaknesses & pains, wh: have scarcely permitted me to do business: The excessive heats of the last week or two have bro’t on me a fever again, which exhausts one in such a manner as to be very discouraging & incapacitates one for every thing: In short, nothing, but a return to America, will ever restore my health, if even that should do it. In these Circumstances, however, we have negotiations to go thro’, and your dispatches to answer.—

The liberal Sentiments in England, respecting Trade, are all lost for the present, & we can get no answer to any thing: It is the same thing with the Dutch. One of the Dutch Ambassadors told me yesterday at Versailles, that now for five weeks the English had never said one word to them, nor given them any answer. These things indicate that the Ministry don’t think themselves permanent.—

The C. de Vergennes asked Dr: Franklin & me yesterday if we had made our visits. We answd. we had, & that they been promptly returned.— The thing in agitation, says the Comte, is for you to determine, whether your Definitive Treaty shall be signed under the mediation of the two Imperial Courts, or not. Ours & the Spanish Treaty with England are to be so finished, & if you determine in favor of it, you have only to write a letter to the Ministers of the Imperial Courts, who are here. I told him, in the present Case, I did not know what a mediation meant.3 He smiled; but did not seem to know any better than I; at least he did not explain it. We told him we wd. determine upon it soon. How we shall determine I cannot say. For my own part, I see no harm in accepting the mediation, nor any other good, than a Compliment to the two Empires. In Europe it may be thought an honour to us, & therefore I shall give my 93voice, as at present informed, in favor of it, as it seems rather to be the Inclination of the C. de Vergennes that we should.—

Your late Dispatches, Sir, are not well-adapted to give spirits to a melancholy man, or to cure one sick of a fever. It is not possible for me at present to enter into a long detail in answer to them. You will be answd. I suppose by all the Gentlemen, jointly— In the mean time I beg leave to say to you a few words upon two Points—4

1st.— The Seperate Article never appeared to me of any Consequence to conceal from this Court. It was an agreement we had a right to make—it contained no injury to France or Spain: indeed I know not what France has, or ever had, to do with it. If it had been communicated to this Court, it wd. probably have been, by them, communicated to Spain, and she might have tho’t more about it, than it was worth.— But how you can conceive it possible for us to treat at all with the English, upon supposition that we had communicated every, the minutest, thing to this Court, when this Court were neither obliged, nor thought proper to communicate any thing whatever to us, I know not. We were bound by Treaty no more than they to communicate. The Instructions were found to be absolutely impracticable.— That they were too suddenly published is very true.—

2dly.— A Communication of the Treaty to this Court, after it was agreed upon, & before it was signed, wd. infallibly have prevented the whole Peace. In the first place, it was very doubtfull, or rather, on the contrary, it is certain the English Minister never wd. have consented that we should communicate it. We might, it is true, have done without his Consent or Knowledge—but what would have been the Consequence? The French Minister would have said the Terms were very good for us, but we must not sign ’till they signed: and this would have been a Continuance of the war for another year at least— It was not so much from an apprehension that the French wd. have exerted themselves to get away from us terms that were agreed on, that they were withheld. It was then too late, & we have reason to apprehend that all of this kind had been done which could be done. We knew they were often insinuating to the British Ministers things against us, respecting the Fisheries, Tories &c. during the negotiation—and Mr: Fitzherbert told me the C. de Vergennes had “fifty times reproached him for ceding the Fisheries, and said it was ruining the English & French Commerce both.”— It was not suspicion—it was certain knowledge, that they were against 94us upon the points of the Tories, Fisheries, Mississippi, & the Western-Country. All this Knowledge, however, did not influence us to conceal the Treaty— We did not, in fact, conceal it— Dr: Franklin communicated the Substance of it to the Comte, & Mr: Rayneval. So did I. In a long Conversation, with the Comte & Mr: Rayneval together, I told them the substance of what was agreed, and what we further insisted on, & the English then disputed.—

But the signing before them is the point. This we could not have done, if we had shewn the Treaty & told them we were ready. The Comte would certainly have said to us, you must not sign till we sign. To have signed after this would have been more disagreable to him & to us too: Yet we must have signed or lost the Peace. The Peace depended on a day. Parliament had been waiting long & once prorogued. The Minister was so pressed he could not have met Parliament & kept his place, without an agreement upon terms, at least with America— If we had not signed the Ministry would have been changed and the Coalition come in—and the whole world knows the Coalition would not have made Peace upon the present terms & consequently not at all this year. The Iron was struck in the few critical moments when it was of a proper heat, & has been moulded into an handsome vessell: If it had been suffered to cool, it wd. have flown in Pieces like Glass.— Our Countrymen have great reason to rejoice that they obtained so good a Peace, when & as they did. With the present threat’ning appearances of a Northern war, which will draw in France, if our Peace was still to be made, we might find cause to tremble for many great advantages that are now secured. I believe the Comte himself, if he were now to speak his real Sentiments, wd. say he is very glad we signed when we did, & that without asking his Consent. The Duc de la Vauguyon told me & Mr: Brantzen, together, last Saturday, “if you had not signed when you did, we should not have signed when we did”— If they had not signed when they did, D’Estaing would have sailed from Cadiz, and in that case nobody wd. have signed to this day.— It is not possible for men to be in more disagreable Circumstances than we were. We are none of us men of principles or dispositions to take pleasure in going against your Sentiments, Sir, much less those of Congress: But, in this case, if we had not done it, our Country would have lost Advantages beyond Computation.—

On Monday, Sir, we pursued our visits & today we finish. Yesterday at Court all the foreign Ministers behaved towards us, without reserve, as Members of the Corps Diplomatique—so that we shall no 95longer see those lowering Countenances, solemn looks, distant Bows, & other peculiarities, which have been sometimes diverting & sometimes provoking, for so many years.—

With great respect & Esteem, I have the honor to be, / Sir, / Your Most Obedt: / humle: servt:

In the present violent heat of the Weather, and feverish state of my own health, I cannot pretend to sit long at my Pen, and must pray you to accept of a few short hints only.

To talk, in a general stile, of Confidence in the French Court &ca. is to use a general language, which may mean almost any thing, or almost nothing.— To a certain degree, and as far as the Treaties and Engagements extend, I have as much Confidence in the French Court, as Congress has, or even as you, Sir, appear to have.

But if by Confidence in the French Court is meant, an Opinion that the French Office of foreign Affairs would be Advocates with the English for our rights to the Fishery, or the Mississippi River, or our Western Territory, or Advocates to persuade the British Ministers to give up the Cause of the Refugees, and make a parliamentary provision for them, I own I have no such Confidence, and never had.— Seeing and hearing what I have seen and heard, I must have been an Idiot to have entertained such Confidence— And having no such Confidence, I should be more of a Machevilian, or a Jesuit, than I ever was, or will be, to counterfeit it to you or to Congress.

Mr. Marbois Letter is to me full proof of the principles of the C. de Vergennes. Why? Because I know, (for it was personally communicated to me upon my passage home by Mr. Marbois himself) the Intimacy and the Confidence there is between these two— And I know farther, that that Letter contains Sentiments concerning the Fisheries diametrically opposite to those, which Mr. Marbois repeatedly expressed to me upon the Passage, vizt. “That the Newfoundland Fishery was our right, and we ought to maintain it.” From whence I conclude, that Mr. Marbois Sentiments have been changed by the Instructions of the Minister. To what purpose is it, where this Letter came from? Is it less genuine, whether it came from Philadelphia, Versailles, or London? What if it came thro’ English Hands? Is there less weight, less evidence in it, for that? Are the Sentiments more just, or more friendly to Us, for that?

Mr. Rayneval’s Correspondence too with Mr. Jay. Mr. Rayneval is a Chef du Bureau. But we must be very ignorant of all Courts not to know, that an Under Secretary of State dares not carry on such a Correspondence without the Knowledge, Consent and Orders of the Principal.

There is another point now in agitation, in which the French will never give Us one good word. On the contrary, they will say every thing they can think of to persuade the English to deprive Us of the Trade of their West India Islands. They have already, with their Emissaries, been the chief Cause of the Change of Sentiments in London on this head against Us.

In general, they see with pain every appearance of returning real & cordial Friendship, such as may be permanent between Us and Great Britain. On the contrary they see with pleasure every Seed of Contention between Us. The Tories are an excellent Engine of Mischief between Us, and therefore very precious.— Exclusion of from2 the West India Islands, will be another.

I hold it to be the indispensible duty of my Station, not to conceal from Congress these Truths. Dont let Us be Dupes, under the Idea of being grateful. Innumerable Anecdotes happen daily to shew that these Sentiments are general.3

In Conversation a few Weeks ago with the Duke de la Vauguyon, upon the subject of the West India Trade, I endeavoured to convince him, that France & England both ought to admit Us freely to their Islands. He entered into a long Argument, to prove that both ought to exclude Us. At last I said, “the English were a parcel of Sots to exclude Us— for the consequence of it would be, that in 15 97or 20 Years we should have another War with them.” “Tant mieux! Tant mieux! Tant mieux! Je vous en felicite—” cried the Duke, with great pleasure. “Tant mieux pour nous,” says I, because we shall conquer from the English in that Case all their Islands, the Inhabitants of which would now declare for Us, if they dared— But it will be not the better for the English. They will be the Sots and Dupes, if they lay a foundation for it.— “Oui Monsieur, says the Duke, je crois que vous aurez une autre guerre contre les Anglais.”—4 And in this wish he expressed the feelings and the Vows of every Frenchman upon the face of the Earth.

If therefore We have it in Contemplation to avoid a future War with the English, dont let Us have too much Confidence in the French, that they will favor Us in this View.

I have the honor to be, with great Respect / and Esteem, / Sir, / your most obedient & / most humble Servant.