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the 2d, 5th, and 7th of this month, and at the same time to make my excuses for not answering them earlier; which was owing to my hurry of business, in part, and part to my hopes of being able to send you something agreeable from America, when I should next write you. Forgive, therefore, this seeming inattention, and accept my warmest thanks for the kind sentiments which you and your good lady entertain for me and my country. The cause of the Americans is the cause of mankind in general, and naturally interests the generous and the good in every part of the world.

The measures you took before my arrival, respecting this Court, were perfectly right, and you may rely on my secrecy as to your concerns. Our commerce is now on as good a footing in this kingdom and in Spain as the commerce of any other nation; and I trust will very soon have an important preference. When I said in a former letter we wanted only a friendly intercourse by way of commerce, I had not the vanity to suppose the actual assistance of European Powers was not an object deserving attention; but I must say seriously, that if the American commerce can be established with the trading Powers of Europe, and if those Powers of Europe would protect that commerce, it would be all the assistance necessary; and the Colonies by land would be more than equal to any thing Great Britain could bring against them. You are entirely right in saying that the House of Bourbon are the allies we should first and principally court. France is at the head of this House, and therefore what is done here is sure to be done by the whole. This, therefore, requires my whole attention, and I can only say to you my prospects are nowise discouraging.

As to the King of Prussia, I will in my next explain more fully my meaning, and at the same time send to you a state of the United Colonies, of their commerce, of their present contest, with some thoughts or observations on the manner in which Europe must be affected, and what part they ought to take in the present important crisis. My name and business have long since been known to the British Ambassador here, and to the Court of London; and they have remonstrated, but finding remonstrances to no purpose, they have wisely determined to take no notice of me, as I do not appear as yet in a public character.

Let me ask of you if a workman skillful in the founding of brass and iron cannon can be engaged in Holland to go to America? Also,

if I can engage two or three persons of approved skill in lead mines to go to America on good engagement? Your answer will oblige me, and by the next post I will write you more particularly. The British arms will not, probably, effect anything in America this season, as they had not begun to act the 8th of August, and that brings winter to the very door, as I may say, and an indecisive campaign must prove to Great Britain a fatal one.

I am, &c.,

SILAS DEANE.

ARTHUR LEE TO C. W. F. DUMAS.

London, September 23d, 1776.

Dear Sir,

My absence from town till now prevented my answering your two last favors of September 3d.

By our latest and best accounts from America, the die is now cast, and we may every day expect to hear of a decisive action at New York; decisive I mean as to the fate of General Howe and New York, but not of America, which depends very little upon the event of New York being taken or saved.

There is a public torpor here, which, without being superstitious, one may regard as a visitation from Heaven. The people in general think the Declaration of Independence as a thing of course, and do not seem to feel themselves at all interested in the vast consequences which that event must inevitably draw after it. The Ministry have, by certain manoeuvres, contrived to keep up the demand for, and price of manufactures; and while trade and manufactures apparently prosper, the people are so deaf that wisdom may cry out in the streets and not be heard. But the course of the seasons is not more fixed than it is certain that these ministerial arts must be temporary in their operation and fatal in their issue; because, the more men are flattered the more desperate they are when the calamity comes upon them. Already the West India Islands begin to cry out, as you will have seen in the address from the Island of Barbadoes. The great number of captures lately made of West India ships by the Americans have already had very visible effects upon the Royal Exchange. Holland, taking the alarm which the least movement on the part of VOL. V.-14

France would produce, must shake our stocks to the foundation, and give an equal shock to a deluded Prince and a deluded people.

The characters you desire me to touch upon are such as seldom occur in the same period. Lord Sandwich has been noted through a long life for everything in word and deed directly opposite to honesty and virtue. With moderate abilities, and little real application, he maintains an appearance of both by impositions and professions which, at a time so averse to inquiry as the present, pass for facts. Lord George Germain, though cradled in England, has all the principles of a Scotchman; subtle, proud, tyrannical, and false. In consequence of his patronising the Scots, they have always been his panegyrists and his advocates, and as they are a people indefatigable in all interested pursuits, they have procured him a character for ability which he very little deserves. Dissimulation and craft in worldly occurrences too often pass for real wisdom; and in that sense Lord George is a wise man. Such a man could not long pass unnoticed and unpatronised by a Court which searches with Lyncean eyes for the basest hearts, and is actuated by Scotch principles and Scotch counsels. Lord Suffolk is a peer of sullen pride and arbitrary principles. He listed in the public cause with Mr. Wedderburne, under the banner of George Grenville; and while his life gave the hope of success in getting preferment, they were the loudest in opposition; but immediately upon his death they made their terms, and have been ever since the most devoted tools of the Court. Lord Suffolk recommends himself very much to the King by an indefatigable attention to the little detail business of his department, and an obsequiousness that knows no bounds. Lord Rochford is by birth a Tory, and is linked with Lord Mansfield; but his fears have made him withdraw himself upon an ample pension, for he is persuaded that France will soon strike a blow which will endanger the heads of those who conduct these measures.

I have been apprized by Hortalez that the business for which 1 recommended him to you is to be transacted through France, which is the reason of your not seeing him.

I do not conceive you need be under any alarm about intercepted letters, as the Ministry have too much upon their thoughts, and too many more immediately dangerous and known opponents at home, to suffer them to look abroad for victims. Their success must be certain and decisive before they will venture to attack the friends of

America in Europe, and provoke retaliation. I flatter myself with being as much within the eye of their enmity as any man can be ; but I think that the enmity of bad men is the most desirable testimony of virtuous merit.

Adieu,

ARTHUR LEE.

TO THE COMMITTEE OF SECRET CORRESPONDENCE.

Gentlemen,

September 30th, 1776.

After having sent to your correspondent at St. Eustatia, whose address you gave me in your letter of the 12th of December, 1775, my third letter, of which you have here annexed a large extract, I commence my fourth despatch.

M. Hortalez, of whom Mr. Arthur Lee spoke in two of his letters, has not yet appeared; nor have I received the letter that you say you have written to me between that of the 12th of December, 1775, and that of the 2d of March, 1776. The non-appearance of this gentleman, and of the letter here referred to, disquiets me somewhat, not only because all that comes to me from you gentlemen, and from your friends, is dear and precious to me, but also and above all because I fear that the service of the general Congress may suffer by it.

The bearer of your letter of the 2d of March (Silas Deane) arrived at Paris the 7th of July, whence he sent it to me with one of his own, dated the 26th. I have another from him of the 18th of August, in which he remarks to me, "that he has a certain prospect of succeeding in his business." He proposes also to visit Holland.

I have before told you that the letters I received had contributed much to render my visits, my letters, and memoirs agreeable in a certain quarter. This will be seen from the following note, which I received a short time since, dated August 26th. After having spoken to me of a service which he had consented to render me in his country, where I had some affairs to settle, and which we had agreed upon as a pretext to mark our interviews, the writer thus proceeds:

"Madame

has taken the trouble to send me your letters,

and I beg you to send me by her all interesting particulars, including the narration of the person whom you expect, (Silas Deane.) I pray you to send me all that you have received since your last letter. I receive packets from all quarters-it pertains to my office. So I shall receive with gratitude whatever you may have the goodness to send me."

I have sent to him open, with a flying seal, the letter that I wrote you by St. Domingo. We agreed on this verbally, and he promised me to send it to Bordeaux, well recommended. I have cause to think that this letter has been forwarded and pleased certain persons, on whose account I had expressed, at the close of the letter, that when by legislation and a wise constitution you shall have crowned the work of your liberty, I shall die content with having seen a great King and a great Republic sincerely wish the good of the people.

I received some days ago another letter from Mr. Deane, dated at Paris, 14th of September. All the letters that I have received from him, as well from you, are precious to me, and this one doubly so, since besides the kind expressions with which it is filled, my zeal for your cause is recompensed by the testimony that I have well served it.

If I continue not to sign my name, it is not from fear, but because I think your service requires that I remain yet some time unknown, at least until Mr. Deane arrives here, for then I shall be known every where for the most zealous American in all the Republic, and it will be my pride. All that can come of it will be the loss of my present post; but in this case I am sure that Congress will indemnify me by a subsistence suitable for me and mine, seeing that I shall be able to continue useful to them as much, and even more, than in time past, because I shall not be encumbered with other duties, and all my faculties will be employed in the service of America. I have been much mortified in not being at liberty, as I have expressed to Mr. Deane. I should have flown to Paris to assist him, at least by the knowledge I have of many European languages.

I have the honor to be, &c.,

DUMAS.

* M. Dumas usually signed his despatches with a fictitious name.

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