ance, I venture to write to you, especially as I think the subject such an one as you may receive a letter upon with

out censure.

Happy should I have been, if the honest warnings I gave, of the fatal separation of interests, as well as of affections, that must attend the measures commenced while I was in England, had been attended to, and the horrid mischief of this abominable war been thereby prevented. I should still be happy in any successful endeavours for restoring peace, consistent with the liberties, the safety, and honour of America. As to our submitting to the government of Great Britain, it is vain to think of it. She has given us, by her numberless barbarities in the prosecution of the war, and in the treatment of prisoners, by her malice in bribing slaves to murder their masters, and savages to massacre the families of farmers, with her baseness in rewarding the unfaithfulness of servants, and debauching the virtue of honest seamen, intrusted with our property, so deep an impression of her depravity, that we never again can trust her in the management of our affairs and interests. It is now impossible to persuade our people, as I long endeavoured, that the war was merely ministerial, and that the nation bore still a good will to us. The infinite number of addresses printed in your gazettes, all approving this conduct of your government towards us, and encouraging our destruction by every possible means, the great majority in Parliament constantly manifesting the same sentiments, and the popular public rejoicings on occasion of any news of the slaughter of an innocent and virtuous people, fighting only in defence of their just rights; these, together with the recommendations of the same measures by even your cele

brated moralists and divines, in their writings and sermons, that are cited approved and applauded in your great national assemblies; all join in convincing us, that you are no longer the magnanimous and enlightened nation, we once esteemed you, and that you are unfit and unworthy to govern us, as not being able to govern your own passions.

But, as I have said, I should be nevertheless happy in seeing peace restored. For tho', if my friends and the friends of liberty and virtue, who still remain in England, could be drawn out of it, a continuance of this war to the ruin of the rest would give me less concern, I cannot, as that removal is impossible, but wish for peace for their sakes, as well as for the sake of humanity, and preventing further carnage.

This wish of mine, ineffective as it may be, induces me to mention to you, that, between nations long exasperated against each other in war, some act of generosity and kindness towards prisoners on one side has softened resentment, and abated animosity on the other, so as to bring on an accommodation. You in England, if you wish for peace, have at present the opportunity of trying this means, with regard to the prisoners now in your goals. They complain of very severe treatment. They are far from their friends and families, and winter is coming on, in which they must suffer extremely, if continued in their present situation; fed scantily on bad provisions, without warm lodging, clothes, or fire, and not suffered to invite or receive visits from their friends, or even from the humane and charitable of their enemies.

I can assure you, from my own certain knowledge, that your people, prisoners in America, have been treated with

great kindness; they have been served with the same rations of wholesome provisions with our own troops, comfortable lodgings have been provided for them, and they have been allowed large bounds of villages in a healthy air, to walk and amuse themselves with on their parole. Where you have thought fit to employ contractors to supply your people, these contractors have been protected and aided in their operations. Some considerable act of kindness towards our people would take off the reproach of inhumanity in that respect from the nation, and leave it where it ought with more certainty to lay, on the conductors of your war in America. This I hint to you, out of some remaining good will to a nation I once sincerely loved. But, as things are, and in my present temper af mind, not being over fond of receiving obligations, I shall content myself with proposing, that your government would allow us to send or employ a commissary to take some care of those unfortunate people. Perhaps on your representations this might speedily be obtained in England, though it was refused most inhumanly at New York.

If you could have leisure to visit the goals in which they are confined, and should be desirous of knowing the truth relative to the treatment they receive, I wish you would take the trouble of distributing among the most necessitous according to their wants, two or three hundred pounds, for which your drafts on me here shall be punctually honour'd. You could then be able to speak with some certainty to the point in Parliament, and this might be attended with good effect.

If you cannot obtain for us permission to send a commissary, possibly you may find a trusty, humane, discreet

person at Plymouth, and another at Portsmouth, who would undertake to communicate what relief we may be able to afford those unhappy, brave men, martyrs to the cause of liberty. [Your King will not reward you for taking this trouble, but God will.] I shall not mention the good will of America; you have what is better, the applause of your own good conscience. Our captains have set at liberty above 200 of your people, made prisoners by our armed vessels and brought into France, besides a great number dismissed at sea on your coasts, to whom vessels were given to carry them in: But you have not returned us a man in exchange. If we had sold your people to the Moors at Sallee, as you have many of ours to the African and East India Companies, could you have complained?

In revising what I have written, I found too much warmth in it, and was about to strike out some parts. Yet I let them go, as they will afford you this one reflection; "If a man naturally cool, and render'd still cooler by old age, is so warmed by our treatment of his country, how much must those people in general be exasperated against us? And why are we making inveterate enemies by our barbarity, not only of the present inhabitants of a great country, but of their infinitely more numerous posterity; who will in future ages detest the name of Englishman, as much as the children in Holland now do those of Alva and Spaniard." This will certainly happen, unless your conduct is speedily changed, and the national resentment falls where it ought to [fall] heavily, on your ministry, [or perhaps rather on the King, whose will they only execute].

With the greatest esteem and affection, and best wishes for your prosperity, I have the honour to be, dear Sir, &c. B. FRANKLIN.

856. TO CAPTAINS THOMAS THOMPSON AND

ELISHA HINMAN

(L. C.)

Paris, 25th Novem3, 1777.

SIR: We advise you on your return to L'Orient to put your Ship in readiness for Sea,' - Capt. Hinman will do the same, and after you have obtained the best intelligence to be had of the British Merchant Ships and Commerce to pursue the Course which you judge best for interrupting and making prizes on our Enemies ships and property. As it is by no means safe to return into the Ports of France, you will calculate your Stores, so as to have a sufficiency for your cruise, which we cannot indeed be particular in the Direction of. It has been suggested that one or more of the India Ships returning may be intercepted, that part of the West India homeward-bound Ships may be expected about this Time, as well as Transports returning from New York and elsewhere in America, and that by cruising in the proper Latitudes you may meet with them. That the British Factories and Commerce on the African Coast at this time lie without any Force sufficient to protect them, and that by running along that Coast you may greatly annoy and distress the Enemy in that Quarter, and afterwards go for the West Indies.

As you and Captain Hinman have already considered

1 The Raleigh, a frigate of thirty-two guns. Captain Hinman's ship, Alfred, carried twenty guns. They arrived at L'Orient November the 7th with two of the Jamaica fleet taken by them in the English Channel. sailed from L'Orient December 29 at 3 P.M.- Ed.

They