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and much better situated for commerce. For these same reasons, the western and southern people are inclined to the measure, and it is thought it may be carried. But these are difficult affairs, and usually take longer time than the projectors imagine. Mr. Crowley, the author of several proposals for uniting the colonies with the mother country, and who runs about much among the ministers, tells me, the union of Ireland is only the first step towards a general union. He is for having it done by the Parliament of England, without consulting the colonies, and he will warrant, he says, that if the terms proposed are equitable, they will all come in one after the other. He seems rather a little cracked upon the subject.

It is said here, that the famous Boston letters were sent chiefly, if not all, to the late Mr. Whately. They fell into my hands, and I thought it my duty to give some principal people there a sight of them, very much with this view, that, when they saw the measures they complained of took their rise in a great degree from the representations and recommendations of their own countrymen, their resentment against Britain on account of those measures might abate, as mine had done, and a reconciliation be more easily obtained. In Boston they concealed who sent them, the better to conceal who received and communicated them. And perhaps it is as well, that it should continue a secret. Being of that country myself, I think those letters more heinous than you seem to think them; but you had not read them all, nor perhaps the Council's remarks on them. I have written to decline their agency, on account of my return to America. Dr. Lee succeeds me. I only keep it while I stay, which perhaps will be another winter.

Governor Hutchinson's Letters.

VOL. VIII.

H

I grieve to hear of the death of my good old friend, Dr. Evans. I have lost so many, since I left America, that I begin to fear that I shall find myself a stranger among strangers, when I return. If so, I must come again to my friends in England. I am ever your affectionate father,

B. FRANKLIN.

TO THOMAS CUSHING.

Project to avoid repealing the American Tea Duty. London, 12 September, 1773.

SIR,

The above is a copy of my last, by the packet. Enclosed is the original letter therein mentioned. His Lordship continues in the country, but is expected, Secretary Pownall tells me, the beginning of next month.

To avoid repealing the American tea duty, and yet find a vent for tea, a project is executing to send it from hence on account of the East India Company, to be sold in America, agreeable to a late act, empowering the Lords of the Treasury to grant licenses to the company to export tea thither, under certain restrictions, duty free. Some friends of government, as they are called, in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, &c., are to be favored with the commission, who undertake by their interest to carry the measure through in the colonies. How the other merchants, thus excluded from the tea trade, will like this, I cannot foresee. Their agreement, if I remember right, was not to import tea, till the duty shall be repealed. Perhaps they will think themselves still obliged by that agreement, notwithstanding this temporary expedient; which is only to

introduce the tea for the present, and may be dropped next year, and the duty again required, the granting or refusing such license from time to time remaining in the power of the treasury. And it will seem hard, while their hands are tied, to see the profits of that article all engrossed by a few particulars.

Enclosed I take the liberty of sending you a small piece of mine, written to expose, in as striking a light as I could, to the nation, the absurdity of the measures towards America, and to spur the ministry if possible to a change of those measures.* Please to present my duty to the House, and respects to the Committee. I have the honor to be, with much esteem, Sir, &c. B. FRANKLIN.

TO JOHN BASKERVILLE.

Sale of Printers' Types. -Sheet of Chinese Paper.

DEAR SIR,

London, 21 September, 1773

I duly received your favor, and some time after the packet containing the specimens, and your valuable. present of Shaftesbury, excellently printed, for which I hold myself greatly obliged to you. The specimens I shall distribute by the first ship among the printers of America, and I hope to your advantage. I suppose no orders will come unaccompanied by bills, or money, and I would not advise you to give credit, especially as I do not think it will be necessary.

The sheet of Chinese paper, from its size, is a great curiosity. I see the marks of the mould in it.

One

• This piece was probably the “Rules by which a Great Empire may be reduced to a Small One;" or "An Edict of the King of Prussia." See Vol. IV. pp. 3-7, 309.

side is smooth; that, I imagine, is the side that was applied to the smooth side of the kiln on which it was dried. The little ridges on the other side I take to be marks of a brush passed over it to press it against that face, in places where it might be kept off by air between, which would otherwise prevent its receiving the smoothness. But we will talk further of this, when I have the pleasure of seeing you.*

You speak of enlarging your foundery. Here are all the matrices of Rumford's and James's founderies to be sold. There seems to be among them some tolerable Hebrews and Greeks, and some good blacks. I suppose you know them. Shall I buy any of them for you? I thank you for your kind invitation. Perhaps I may embrace it for a few days. My best respects to good Mrs. Baskerville, and believe me ever, with great esteem, &c.

B. FRANKLIN.

TO WILLIAM FRANKLIN.

Right of the British Parliament to make Laws binding the Colonies, denied. Lord Mansfield's Opinion of the pretended Prussian Edict. - The Reading of it at Lord Le Despencer's by Paul Whitehead.

DEAR SON,

London, 6 October, 1773.

I wrote to you on the 1st of last month, since which I have received yours of July 29th, from New York. I know not what letters of mine Governor Hutchinson could mean, as advising the people to insist on their

See a description of the mode of making Chinese paper, Vol. VI.

p. 577.

independency. But, whatever they were, I suppose he has sent copies of them hither, having heard some whisperings about them. I shall, however, be able at any time to justify every thing I have written; the purport being uniformly this, that they should carefully avoid all tumults and every violent measure, and content themselves with verbally keeping up their claims, and holding forth their rights whenever occasion requires; secure, that, from the growing imporcance of America, those claims will ere long be attended to and acknowledged.

From a long and thorough consideration of the subject, I am indeed of opinion, that the Parliament has no right to make any law whatever, binding on the colonies; that the King, and not the King, Lords, and Commons collectively, is their sovereign; and that the King, with their respective Parliaments, is their only legislata: I know your sentiments differ from mine on these subjects. You are a thorough government man, which I do not wonder at, nor do I aim at converting you. I only wish you to act uprightly and steadily, avoiding that duplicity, which, in Hutchinson, adds contempt to indignation. If you can promote the prosperity of your people, and leave them happier than you found them, whatever your political principles are, your memory will be honored.

I have written two pieces here lately for the Public Advertiser, on American affairs, designed to expose the conduct of this country towards the colonies in a short, comprehensive, and striking view, and stated, therefore, in out-of-the-way forms, as most likely to take the general attention. The first was called "Rules by

• Governor Hutchinson procured a copy of one of Dr. Franklin's letters, and sent it to the ministry. See Vol. IV. p. 450,

VOL. VIII.

12

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