communication of any hints, that your knowledge or experience may suggest on this subject, which is interesting not only to Manchester, but to most other manufacturing towns.

We have now established here an institution on a plan similar to the late Academy at Warrington, and in conjunction with this a medical school is formed, which seems to bid fair for eminent success. I will send you our Reports when the Manchester Memoirs are forwarded to you.

Dr. and Mrs. Priestley have been here this summer, together with Dr. Kippis. Dr. Priestley is not in a very good state of health, having had a return of the complaint with which he was visited several years ago; but his spirits and ardor do not desert him. He is at this time zealously engaged in attempts to convert the Jews to Christianity. For this undertaking he believes himself peculiarly well fitted, as it is a part of his creed that Jesus Christ was the actual son of Joseph, and a lineal descendant of the house of David. But the Jewish rabbis have declared their resolution to enter into no discussion on these topics, being forbidden, as they allege, by their most sacred laws.

Dr. Kippis is busied with the Life of Captain Cook, which is to be published separately, as well as in the Biographia Britannica. Our excellent friend, Dr. Price, is, I hear, deeply affected with the death of his wife. A fresh paralytic stroke carried her off about a month since. The doctor is preparing for the press a volume of sermons in support of the Arian doctrine, and an enlarged edition of his

pass, and the important use which he supposes may be made of that variation, not being satisfied with the judgment of some of our principal mathematicians here, has earnestly desired me to communi- ! cate it to some of my learned friends in Europe. I know no one better acquainted with the subject than yourself, and, as I cannot refuse complying with his request, I beg you will excuse my giving you this trouble, and favor me with a line expressing your opinion; which condescension will very much oblige, sir, your most obedient servant,

B. FRANKLIN.

MCCCCLII

FROM JOHN SEVIER

STATE OF FRANKLIN, Mount PLEASANT, 9 April, 1787. SIR:-Permit me to introduce to your Excellency the subject of our new disputed government. In the year 1784, in the month of June, the Legislature of North Carolina ceded to Congress all their claims to the lands west of the Appalachian Mountains, on conditions I make no doubt you are acquainted with, as the act was shortly after laid before Congress. The inhabitants of this country, well knowing that the Congress of the United States would accept the cession, and having no idea that North Carolina

I The writer here alluded to was John Churchman, who published a work, entitled The Magnetic Atlas. He fancied he had discovered properties in the magnetic needle by which its dip and variation could be ascertained for any given time and place; and also that he had discovered a new method of finding the longitude and explaining the theory of the tides. For Mr. Maskelyne's report on it, see infra.

would attempt repealing the act, formed themselves into a separate and independent State by the name of Franklin.

In November following, North Carolina repealed this act of cession. In May, 1785, Congress took the several acts under their consideration, and entered into resolves respecting the same, the purport of which, I presume, you are acquainted with. The government of Franklin was carried on unmolested by North Carolina, until November, 1785, when that Legislature passed an act, allowing the people in some of our counties to hold elections under certain regulations unknown to any former law; whereby a few from disaffection and disappointment might have it in their power to elect persons, who were to be considered the legal delegation of the people. This was done and countenanced; and at their last session, in November, 1786, they have undertaken to resume their jurisdiction and sovereignty over the State of Franklin, notwithstanding the whole of their adherents do not exceed two or three hundred against a majority of at least seven thousand effective militia. They have, contrary to the interest of the people in two of the counties, to wit, Washington and Sullivan, by their acts removed the former places of holding courts to certain places convenient to the disaffected, as we conceive, in order that they might have a pretext to prevaricate upon.

I have thus given your Excellency the outlines of our past and present situation, and beg leave to inform you that, from your known patriotic and benevolent disposition, as also your great experience

VOL. XI.-20.

of both sides. With great esteem and affection, I

am ever yours,

B. FRANKLIN.

MCCCCXLIV

TO THE CAPTAIN OF A SPANISH MAN-OF-WAR

PHILADELPHIA, 16 December, 1786.

HONORABLE SIR:-The council having received information that the ship under your command lies in a dangerous situation, exposed to be much injured, if not destroyed, by the violence of the driving ice, have thought that not only the duty of hospitality, of duty towards strangers in our port, but the just regard due from us to the excellent prince, your sovereign, and the good friend of these States, required of us to afford every assistance in our power for her preservation. And apprehending that possibly your people, accustomed to warmer climates, may not be so well acquainted with the force and mischievous effects of ice, and the methods of guarding against it, we send to you two of the wardens of the port, men of experience and knowledge in such matters, on whose advice you may rely, and who have authority to obtain such aid from the inhabitants, if any should be wanted, as may enable them to put her in a position of the greatest possible safety. Wishing you every kind of prosperity, I have the honor to be, honorable sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,

B. FRANKLIN.

must consequently have to settle, the public business of a great government to be attended to, and this under the frequent teasing of a painful disease, you will probably make some charitable allowance for his delay in writing to his friends, and not charge it all as the effect of forgetfulness and want of affection.

I now have all your letters of the last year before me, and shall go through them in order. That of March 25th, announced a M. de la Villele, nephew of the late Madame de la Frété, as intending a voyage hither, but he has not yet appeared in these parts. If he arrives while I live, he will be paid every attention and civility in my power to show him.

I thank you for the trouble you have taken in selling my forte piano and dividing the money as I desired.

The Lodge of the Nine Sisters have done me too much honor in proposing the prize you mention.

As to the little history I promised you, my purpose still continues of completing it, and I hoped to do it this summer, having built an addition to my house, in which I have placed my library, and where I can write without being disturbed by the noise of the children, but the General Assembly having lately desired my assistance in a great convention to be held here in May next for amending the Federal Constitution, I begin to doubt whether I can make any progress in it till that business is over.

Yours of the 23d of May did not arrive here till the 5th of October, and this is not the only instance of the long time letters are delayed in your seaports.