row, for a few days,
that having engaged a passage in a ship, which will sail for France
sometime next month, I propose to leave Philadelphia in a few days
after I return from the country, in order to embark, and shall esteem
myself honored by Congress if they have any thing further in which I
may be of service to my country, if they will favor me with their
commands.

I have the honor to remain, &c.

SILAS DEANE.

* * * * *

TO THE PRESIDENT OF CONGRESS.

Philadelphia, 12th October, 1778.

Sir,

In the extracts from the letters of the honorable Mr Izard, I find
charges which respect me, supported by his opinions, and by what he
declares to have heard from the honorable Arthur Lee, who, by his own
account, is my irreconcilable enemy. I find also charges against the
honorable Dr Franklin and myself jointly, supported on the same
grounds, with this difference, that almost every complaint against us
lies equally against Mr Lee, and it is worthy of remark, that where
the charge lies equally against us all, Mr Izard leaves Mr Lee wholly
out, and fixing it solely on Dr Franklin and myself, proceeds to
represent the Doctor as entirely under my influence. My situation has,
through the whole been peculiarly unfortunate, and in nothing more so
than in this, that Mr Izard's letters, written as much with the design
of impeaching Dr Franklin's conduct as mine, now operates solely
against me.

Mr Izard says, in his letter of the first of April, "_That if the
whole world had been searched_, it would have been impossible to have
found a person more unfit than I was for the trust, with which
Congress had honored me." It does not become me, and possibly not even
Mr Izard himself, to determine on my competency to that trust, and I
have only to observe, that both of us were appointed by the authority
of Congress, with this only difference, that I had the honor of being
personally known to the members who composed that body, and I can add
with pleasure, that I always paid respect to Mr Izard from the choice
they had made of him, which I doubt not was on good information. I
shall feel no uneasiness on my own account, that Mr Izard's opinions
of me remain on the journals of Congress, whilst on the same records
there will be found that of his Most Christian Majesty, of his
Minister, and