transmit you the original vouchers, and beg you to proceed
to the verification of both, to assure me of their reception and
correctness. I flatter myself that you will take measures for my
speedy reimbursement, and I ask with the more urgency, as I have a
pressing necessity for this sum, on the payment of which I have
relied. I have the honor to be, &c.

CABARRUS."

This letter needs no comments; it breathes the fears and precautions
of a creditor, striving to make the most of a failing debtor, and
therefore I considered this letter as inauspicious. I returned a
verbal answer, that an examination of these accounts must precede a
settlement of them, and that as to a speedy payment of the balance due
to him, he knew my exact situation.

A day or two before the date of this letter, M. Cabarrus had a
conference with the Minister on these subjects, and according to M.
Cabarrus' representations, the Minister then declared, that he would
pay the balance due on the one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and
no more; that the King was dissatisfied at America's having made no
returns to his good offices, either in ships or flour, &c. &c.; that
he had mentioned to me a year ago his desire of having the men-of-war
building in New England, but had not yet received an answer, &c.

It appeared to me very extraordinary, that the Minister should promise
the Ambassador to do his best, and yet tell M. Cabarrus that he would
do nothing, and yet so I believe were the facts.

The next morning, viz. 26th of February, I paid the Ambassador an
early visit, and mentioned these circumstances to him minutely. I
expressed my apprehensions, that the pretended discontents of the King
belonged to the same system of delays and pretexts, with which we had
been so long amused; and which in this instance were probably
dictated by a desire of avoiding inconvenient advances.

I reminded him, that Dr Franklin had given me expectations of his
being able to replace the money I had borrowed of M. Cabarrus, and
that this sum, added to the balance to be paid by the Court, would
reduce the remainder of the money wanted to less than twenty thousand
pounds sterling; and that it would appear a little surprising in the
eyes of Europe as well as America, that our credit should be permitted
either by France or Spain to suffer essential injury for the want of
such a sum. I requested him to advise me wh