of nations, that the cultivators of the earth are not to be molested or interrupted in their peaceable and useful employment, the inhabitants of the sugar islands would perhaps come under the protection of such a regulation, which would be a great advantage to the nations who at present hold those islands, since the cost of sugar to the consumer in those nations, consists not merely in the price he pays for it by the pound, but in the accumulated charge of all the taxes he pays in every war, to fit out fleets and maintain troops for the defence of the islands that raise the sugar, and the ships that bring it home. But the expense of treasure is not all. A celebrated philosophical writer remarks, that when he considered the wars made in Africa for prisoners to raise sugar in America, the numbers slain in those wars, the numbers that being crowded in ships perish in the transportation, and the numbers that die under the severities of slavery, he could scarce look on a morsel of sugar without conceiving it spotted with human blood. If he had considered also the blood of one another which the white nations shed in fighting for those islands, he would have imagined his sugar not as spotted only, but as thoroughly died red. On these accounts I am persuaded that the subjects of the emperor of Germany, and the empress of Russia, who have no sugar islands, consume sugar cheaper at Vienna and Moscow, with all the charge of transporting it after its arrival in Europe, than the citizens of London or of Paris. And I sincerely believe, that if France and England were to decide by throwing dice which should have the whole of their sugar islands, the loser in the throw would be the gainer.

VOL. II.

The future

T

expense of defending them would be saved: the sugars would be bought cheaper by all Europe if the inhabitants might make it without interruption, and whoever imported the sugar, the same revenue might be raised by the duties at the custom-houses of the nation that consumed it. And on the whole I conceive it would be better for the nations now possessing sugar colonies to give up their claim to them, let them govern themselves, and put them under the protection of all the powers of Europe as neutral countries, open to the commerce of all, the profits of the present monopolies being by no means equivalent to the expense of maintaining them.

ARTICLE.

If war should hereafter arise between Great Britain and the United States, which God forbid, the merchants of either country then residing in the other shall be allowed to remain nine months to collect their debts, and settle their affairs, and may depart freely, carrying off all their effects without molestation or hindrance. And all fishermen, all cultivators of the earth, and all artisans or manufacturers unarmed, and inhabiting unfortified towns, villages or places, who labor for the common subsistence and benefit of mankind, and peaceably follow their respective employments, shall be allowed to continue the same, and shall not be molested by the armed force of the enemy, into whose power by the events of the war they may happen to fall; but if any thing is necessary to be taken from them, for the use of such armed force, the same shall be paid for at a reasonable price. And all merchants or traders with their unarmed vessels, employed in commerce,

1

exchanging the products. of different places, and thereby rendering the necessaries, conveniences, and comforts of human life more easy to obtain, and more general, shall be allowed to pass freely unmolested. And neither of the powers, parties to this treaty, shall grant or issue any commission to any private armed vessels empowering them to take or destroy such trading ships, or interrupt such com

merce.

M. LE COMTE DE VERGENNES A M. FRANKLIN.

Il est essentiel, Monsieur, que je puisse avoir l'honneur de conférer avec vous, avec M. Adams, et avec ceux de Messieurs vos collègues, qui peuvent se trouver à Paris. Je vous prie, en conséquence, Monsieur, de vouloir bien inviter ces Messieurs de se rendre à Versailles avec vous Lundi avant dix heures du matin. Il seroit bon que vous amenassiez Monsieur votre petit-fils avec vous; il pourra nous être nécessaire pour rendre plusieurs choses d'Anglois en François, et même pour écrire. L'objet dont j'ai à vous entretenir est très-intéressant pour les EtatsUnis, vos maîtres.

J'ai l'honneur d'être avec une parfaite considération, Monsieur, votre très-humble et très-obéissant serviteur, DE VERGENNES.

Versailles, le Samedi soir, 18 Janvier, 1783.

SIR,

A M. LE COMTE DE VERGENNES.

Passy, Jan. 18, 1783, at ten P.M. Agreeable to the notice just received from your excellency, I shall acquaint Mr. Adams with your desire to see us on Monday before ten o'clock at Versailles, and we shall endeavor to be punctual. My other colleagues are absent, Mr. Laurens being

gone to Bath in England, to recover his health, and Mr. Jay into Normandy. With great respect I have the honor to be, sir, your excellency's, &c.

B. FRANKLIN.

I shall bring my grandson, as you desire.

TO DAVID HARTLEY, ESQ. M. P.

DEAR SIR, Passy, March 23, 1783. The general proclamations you wished for, suspending or rather putting an end to hostilities, are now published; so that your "heart is at rest," and mine with it. You may depend on my joining my hearty endeavors with yours, in "cultivating conciliatory principles between our two countries," and I may venture to assure you, that if your bill for a provisional establishment of the commerce had passed as at first proposed, a stipulation on our part in the definitive treaty to allow reciprocal and equal advantages and privileges to your subjects, would have been readily agreed to. With great and sincere esteem, I am ever, &c. B. FRANKLIN.

TO DAVID HARTLEY, ESQ. M.P.

DEAR FRIEND,

Passy, May 8, 1783. I send you enclosed the copies you desired of the papers I read to you yesterday.* I should be happy if I could see, before I die, the proposed improvement of the law of nations established. The miseries of mankind would be diminished by it, and the happiness of millions secured and promoted. If the practice of privateering could be profitable to any civilised nation, it might be so to us Americans, since we are so situated on the globe, as that the rich commerce of Europe with the West Indies, con

See the proposition about privateering, annexed to Letter to R. Oswald, Esq. January 14, 1783, p. 286.

sisting of manufactures, sugars, &c. is obliged to pass before our doors, which enables us to make short and cheap cruizes, while our own commerce is in such bulky low-priced articles as that ten of our ships taken by you are not equal in value to one of yours, and you must come far from home at a great expense to look for them. I hope therefore that this proposition, if made by us, will appear in its true light, as having humanity only for its motive. I do not wish to see a new Barbary rising in America, and our long-extended coast occupied by piratical states. I fear lest our privateering success in the two last wars should already have given our people too strong a relish for that most mischievous kind of gaming, mixed blood; and if a stop is not now put to the practice, mankind may hereafter be more plagued with American corsairs than they have been and are with the Turkish. Try, my friend, what you can do, in procuring for your nation the glory of being, though the greatest naval power, the first who voluntarily relinquished the advantage that power seems to give them, of plundering others, and thereby impeding the mutual communications among men of the gifts of God, and rendering miserable multitudes of merchants and their families, artizans, and cultivators of the earth, the most peaceable and innocent part of the human species. With great esteem and affection, I am ever, my dear friend, yours most sincerely, B. FRANKLIN.

DEAR SIR,

TO HENRY LAURENS, ESQ.

Passy, July 6, 1783.

Our negociations go on slowly, every proposition being sent to England, and answers not returnng very speedily.