The Works of Benjamin Franklin

sonable creatures, when they build for themselves combustible dwellings, in which they are every day obliged to use fire. In my new buildings, I have taken a few precautions, not generally used; to wit, none of the wooden work of one room communicates with the wooden work of any other room; and all the floors, and even the steps of the stairs, are plastered close to the boards, besides the plastering on the laths under the joists. There are also trap-doors to go out upon the roofs, that one may go out and wet the shingles in case of a neighbouring fire. But, indeed, I think the staircases should be stone, and the floors tiled as in Paris, and the roofs either tiled or slated.

I am much obliged to your friend and neighbour Mr. Lathrop, for his kind present, and purpose writing to him. It is a discourse well written.

I sent you lately a barrel of flour, and I blame myself for not sooner desiring you to lay in your winter's wood, and drawing upon me for it as last year. But I have been so busy. To avoid such neglect in future, I now make the direction general, that you draw on me every year for the same purpose.

Adieu, my dear sister, and believe me ever your affectionate brother, B. FRANKLIN.

TO M. DUBOURG.*

On the Nature of Sea Coal.

I am persuaded, as well as you, that the sea coal has a vegetable origin, and that it has been formed

* This extract is translated from the French, as printed in M. Dubourg's edition of the author's writings. Its date is uncertain, but it was probably written about the year 1770, and should have been inserted among the philosophical papers of that period.

near the surface of the earth; but, as preceding convulsions of nature had served to bring it very deep in many places, and covered it with many different strata, we are indebted to subsequent convulsions for having brought within our view the extremities of its veins, so as to lead us to penetrate the earth in search of it. I visited last summer a large coal mine at Whitehaven, in Cumberland; and, in following the vein and descending by degrees towards the sea, I penetrated below the ocean, where the level of its surface was more than eight hundred fathoms above my head, and the miners assured me, that their works extended some miles beyond the place where I then was, continually and gradually descending under the sea. The slate, which forms the roof of this coal mine, is impressed in many places with the figures of leaves and branches of fern, which undoubtedly grew at the surface when the slate was in the state of sand on the banks of the sea. Thus it appears, that this vein of coal has suffered a prodigious settlement.—

B. FRANKLIN.

TO THOMAS JEFFERSON.

Concerning the Eastern Boundary of the United States.

SIR,

Philadelphia, 8 April, 1790.*

I received your letter of the 31st of last past, relating to encroachments made on the eastern limits of the United States by settlers under the British government, pretending that it is the western, and not the eastern river of the Bay of Passamaquoddy which was designated by the name of St. Croix, in the

*This letter is dated only nine days before Dr. Franklin's death.

treaty of peace with that nation; and requesting of me to communicate any facts which my memory or papers may enable me to recollect, and which may indicate the true river, which the commissioners on both sides had in their view, to establish as the boundary between the two nations.

Your letter found me under a severe fit of my malady, which prevented my answering it sooner, or attending, indeed, to any kind of business. I now can assure you, that I am perfectly clear in the remembrance that the map we used in tracing the boundary, was brought to the treaty by the commissioners from England, and that it was the same that was published by Mitchell above twenty years before. Having a copy of that map by me in loose sheets, I send you that sheet which contains the Bay of Passamaquoddy, where you will see that part of the boundary traced. I remember, too, that in that part of the boundary we relied much on the opinion of Mr. Adams, who had been concerned in some former disputes concerning those territories. I think, therefore, that you may obtain still further light from him.

That the map we used was Mitchell's map, Congress were acquainted at the time, by a letter to their Secretary for Foreign Affairs, which I suppose may be found upon their files. I have the honor to be, &c., B. FRANKLIN.

INDEXES.

No. I.

LIST OF THE AUTHOR'S WRITINGS, CHRONOLOGICALLY ARRANGED.

This list comprises the titles of Franklin's miscellaneous writings. They are arranged under the years in which they were written or printed. In some instances the dates could not be ascertained with precision. To the titles of such pieces this mark (†) is prefixed. In a few of these instances the nature of the subject, or the matter, points nearly to the time; in others the arrangement is conjectural. Articles not contained in any previous edition of the author's works are denoted by a (*); and to such as have not before been printed this mark (†) is prefixed.