COMMITTEE OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS TO THE COMMISSIONERS.

Philadelphia, May 30th, 1777.

Gentlemen,

We have delayed sending this packet, from a daily expectation of
hearing from you, as some letters from France make mention of a quick
sailing vessel, by which we were to receive despatches. Though it must
be agreeable to you to hear frequently from us, yet as our letters by
being taken might be of worse consequence than being delayed, we are
desirous of waiting for the safest opportunity, and when you hear not
so often as you wish, remember our silence means our safety.
Acquainted as we are, with the situation and condition of the enemy,
we well know, that the pompous paragraphs in the London papers are not
the news, which the Ministry _hear from_ their army; but the news they
make for them.

The Amphitrite has arrived in Portsmouth, New Hampshire; and the Seine
at Martinique, but she is made a prize of, in her passage from thence.
We request you to expedite the loan of two millions, (which we have
already sent you a commission for, and now send you a duplicate of the
same) for though we conceive the credit of America to be as well
founded at least as any in the world, having neither debt nor taxes
when she began the war, yet she is like a man who, with a large
capital all in property, is unable to make any new purchases, till he
can either convert some of it into specie, or borrow in the mean time.
Britain is now fighting us, and the greatest part of Europe
negatively, by endeavoring to stop that trade from us to France,
Spain, &c. which she has most effectually lost to herself, and we wish
those Courts saw their interest in the same clear point of view in
which it appears to us. We have little or no doubt of being able to
reduce the enemy by land, and we likewise believe that the united
powers of France, Spain, and America would be able to expel the
British fleet from the western seas, by which the communication for
trade would be opened, the number of interests reduced which have
hitherto distracted the West Indies, and consequently the peace of all
this side of the globe put on a better foundation than it has hitherto
been; a mutual advantage, as we conceive, to France, Spain, and these
States.

That Britain was formidable last war, in the West Indies, is true, but
when it is considered that her power there arose from her possessions
here, or that she was formidable chiefly