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TO JOSEPH GALLOWAY.

Supposed Disposition to compose the Differences with America. Tea Duty.

London, 3 November, 1773.

SIR,

There is at present great quietness here, and no prospect that the war between the Turks and Russians will spread farther in Europe. The last harvest is allowed to have been generally plentiful in this country; and yet, such was the preceding scantiness of crops, that it is thought there is no corn to spare for exportation, which continues the advantages to our corn provinces.

The Parliament is not to meet till after the middle of January. It is said, there is a disposition to compose all differences with America before the next general election, as the trading and manufacturing part of the nation are generally our wellwishers, think we have been hardly used, and apprehend ill consequences from a continuance of the measures that we complain of; and that, if those measures are not changed, an American interest may be spirited up at the election against the present members who are in, or friends to administration. Our steady refusal to take tea from hence for several years past has made its impressions. The scheme for supplying us without repealing the act, by a temporary license from the treasury to export tea to America, free of duty, you are before this time acquainted with. I much want to hear how that tea is received. If it is rejected, the act will undoubtedly be repealed, otherwise I suppose it will be continued; and when we have got into the use of the Company's tea, and the foreign correspondences that

supply us at present are broken off, the licenses will be discontinued, and the act enforced.

I apprehend the better understanding, that lately subsisted in our provincial administration, will hardly be continued with the new governor; but you will soon see. I wish for the full letter you promise me by the next packet, which is now daily expected. With unalterable esteem and attachment, I am, &c. B. FRANKLIN.

TO WILLIAM FRANKLIN.

DEAR SON,

London, 3 November, 1773.

I wrote you pretty fully by the last packet, and having had no line from you of later date than the beginning of August, and little stirring here lately, I have now little to write.

In that letter I mentioned my having written two papers, of which I preferred the first, but the public the last. It seems I was mistaken in judging of the public opinion; for the first was reprinted some weeks after in the same paper, the printer giving for reason, that he did it in compliance with the earnest request of many private persons, and some respectable societies; which is the more extraordinary, as it had been copied in several other papers, and in the Gentleman's Magazine. Such papers may seem to have a tendency to increase our divisions; but I intend a contrary effect, and hope, by comprising in little room, and setting in a strong light, the grievances of the colonies, more attention will be paid to them by our administration, and that, when their unreasonableness is generally seen, some of them will be removed, to the restoration of harmony between us.

VOL. VIII.

7

B. FRANKLIN.

FROM SAMUEL COOPER TO B. FRANKLIN.

Method of warming Churches. - Hutchinson's Letters. Samuel Adams.-Major Hawley.

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DEAR SIR,

Boston, 10 November, 1773.

I received your valuable favors of the 7th and 25th of July, and you will please to accept the thanks of the committee of our congregation, as well as my own, for the trouble you have very kindly given yourself in your clear and particular account of the warming machines for large rooms, and your advice respecting our new building, together with the truly philosophical and convincing reasons upon which it is founded. All, to to whom I have read that part of your letter, have been highly entertained with it; and I must particularly thank you for your observation, that we do not receive the disorder called a cold from cold air, and therefore never at meeting, being proud of supporting myself with your authority against some of our physicians, who seem to think that all the disorders of their patients are caught there. Your letter has satisfied my whole congregation, and we are now all determined to worship and make ourselves as comfortable as may be more majorum.*

After all the solicitous inquiries of the governor and his friends respecting his letters, it still remains a secret from whom and to whom they came. This is known here to two persons only besides myself, and will, I believe, remain undiscovered, unless farther intelligence should come from your side of the water, than I have reason to think has yet been obtained;

* See the account of the method of warming public buildings, here alluded to, in Vol. VI. p. 397.

though I cannot but admire your honest openness in this affair, and negligence of any inconveniences, that might arise to yourself in this essential service to our injured country.

I have the pleasure to find, that a confidence in your abilities and principles is very far from being diminished in our House of Commons, and to assure you, that one of the members for this town, Mr. Samuel Adams, a correspondent of Dr. Lee's, who had the chief hand in a letter from the House to you, which I. perceive by your reply gave you uneasiness, has lately expressed the warmest esteem of you as an important and thorough friend to the rights of America.* This gentleman I regard for his uncommon zeal and activity in support of these rights; but I have repeatedly found occasion in a friendly manner to blame his excessive jealousy, in a cause peculiarly dear to him, which has sometimes led him to treat not in the kindest manner some of its faithful advocates, and particularly Governor Pownall. The Speaker, and many others in the House, are your steady friends, particularly Major Hawley, from Northampton; a gentleman of the law, who speaks with uncommon clearness and force, and is behind no man there in point of influence. I mention these things from no other motive than an apprehension, that, at your distance from us, it might be some satisfaction and direction to you to know them.

There has been an attempt by Mr. Sewall, (as is generally believed,) judge of the admiralty for Nova Scotia, and our attorney-general, to vindicate the governor's letters, in one of our newspapers. The sophis

* For the source of Mr. Adams's impressions, in regard to Dr. Franklin, see the extracts from Arthur Lee's letter to him above, p. 57; and also a reference to an anonymous letter, Vol. VII. p. 548.

try made but a feeble impression, and, except among a few, rather provoked than pacified. I am, &c. SAMUEL COOPER.

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I received the honor of yours dated October 28th, with the journals of the House and Mr. Turner's Election Sermon. I waited on Lord Dartmouth, on his return to town, and learned that he had presented to his Majesty our petition for the removal of the governors. No subsequent step had yet been taken upon it; but his Lordship said, the King would probably refer the consideration of it to a committee of Council, and that I should have notice to be heard in support of it. By the turn of his conversation, though he was not explicit, I apprehend the petition is not likely to be complied with; but we shall see. His Lordship expressed, as usual, much concern at the differences subsisting, and wished they would be accommodated. Perhaps his good wishes are all that is in his power.

The famous letters having unfortunately engaged Mr. Temple and Mr. Whately in a duel, which being interrupted, would probably be renewed, I thought it incumbent on me to prevent, as far as I could, any farther mischief, by declaring publicly the part I had in the affair of those letters, and thereby at the same time to rescue Mr. Temple's character from an undeserved and groundless imputation, that bore hard upon

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