rd in drawing money for their own expenses.
In February, 1778, each insisted that he should be allowed a credit with
the banker, M. Grand, to an amount of L2000, as each then expected to
depart on a mission. Franklin reluctantly assented, and was then
astonished and indignant to find that each at once drew out the full sum
from the national account; yet neither went upon his journey. In
January, 1779, Izard applied for more. Franklin's anger was stirred;
Izard was a man of handsome private property, and was rendering no
service in Paris; and his requirements seemed to Franklin eminently
unpatriotic and exorbitant. He therefore refused the request, writing to
Izard a letter which is worth quoting, both from the tone of its
patriotic appeal and as a vivid sketch of the situation:--

"Your intimation that you expect more money from us obliges us to
expose to you our circumstances. Upon the supposition that Congress
had borrowed in America but $5,000,000, and relying on the
remittances intended to be sent to us for answering other demands,
we gave expectations that we should be able to pay here the
interest of that sum as a means of supporting the credit of the
currency. The Congress have borrowed near twice that sum, and are
now actually drawing on us for the interest, the bills appearing
here daily for acceptance. Their distress for money in America has
been so great from the enormous expense of the war that they have
also been induced to draw on us for very large sums to stop other
pressing demands; and they have not been able to purchase
remittances for us to the extent they proposed; and of what they
have sent, much has been taken, or treacherously carried into
England, only two small cargoes of tobacco having arrived, and they
are long since mortgaged to the Farmers General, so that they
produce us nothing, but leave us expenses to pay.

"The continental vessels of war which come to France have likewise
required great sums of us to furnish and refit them and supply the
men with necessaries. The prisoners, too, who escape from England
claim a very expensive assistance from us, and are much
dissatisfied with the scanty allowance we are able to afford them.
The interest bills above mentioned, of the drawing of which we have
received notice, amount to $2,500,000, and we have not a fifth part
of the