did not seem worth while for him to
unravel at a cost of much time and labor, which could be better expended
in other occupations.[41] Deane held all the threads, and it seemed
natural and proper to leave this business as his department. So Franklin
never had more than a general knowledge concerning this imbroglio.

This leaving all to Deane might have been well enough had not Deane had
an implacable enemy in Arthur Lee, who, for that matter, resembled the
devil in at least one particular, inasmuch as he was the foe of all
mankind. Beaumarchais early in the proceedings had summarily dropped Lee
from his confidence and instated Deane in the vacancy. This was
sufficient to set Lee at once at traducing, an art in which long
experience had cultivated natural aptitude. He saw great sums of money
being used, and he was not told whence they came. But he guessed, and
upon his guess he built up a theory of financial knavery. Deane had
repeatedly assured Beaumarchais that he should receive the cargoes of
American produce with promptitude,[42] and he did his best to make these
promises good, writing urgent letters to Congress to hasten forward the
colonial merchandise. But Arthur Lee mischievously and maliciously
blocked these perfectly straightforward and absolutely necessary
arrangements. For he had conceived the notion that Beaumarchais was an
agent of the French court, that the supplies were free gifts from the
French government, and that any payments for them to Hortalez & Co.
would only go to fill the rascal purses of Deane and Beaumarchais,
confederates in a scheme for swindling. He had no particle of evidence
to sustain this notion, which was simply the subtle conception of his
own bad mind; but he was not the less positive and persistent in
asserting it in his letters to members of Congress. Such accounts sadly
puzzled that body; and it may be imagined to what a further hopeless
degree of bewilderment this gathering of American lawyers and tradesmen,
planters and farmers, must have been reduced by the extraordinary
letters of the wild and fanciful Beaumarchais. The natural consequence
was that the easier course was pursued, and no merchandise was sent to
Hortalez. If affairs had not soon taken a new turn in France this error
might have had disastrous consequences for the colonies. In fact, it
only ruined poor Deane.

[Note 41: Franklin's _Works_, vi. 199, 205; viii. 153, 183; Hale's
_Franklin in France_, i. 53.]

[Note