The same person wrote to me June 14th, 1773, in these terms: "I have endeavored inviolabiy to keep to your injunctions with respect to the papers you sent me; I have shewn them only to such persons as you directed; no one person, except Dr. Cooper and one of the committee, knows from whom they came, or to whom they were sent: I have constantly avoided mentioning your name upon the occasion, so that it never need be known (if you incline to keep it a secret) who they came from, and to whom they were sent; and I desire, so far as I am concerned, my name may not be mentioned; for it may be a damage to me. I thought it however my duty to communicate them as permitted, as they contained matters of importance that very nearly affected the government. And notwithstanding all my care and precaution, it is now publicly known that such letters are here. Considering the number of persons who were to see them, (not less than ten or fifteen) it is astonishing they did not get air before."Then he goes on to relate how the assembly having heard of them, obliged him to produce them; but engaged not to print them; and that they afterwards did nevertheless print them, having got over that engagement by the appearance of copies in the house, produced by a member who it was reported had just received them from England. This letter concludes, "I have done all in my power strictly to conform to your restrictions, but from the circumstances above related, you must be sensible it was impossible to prevent the letters being made public, and therefore hope I shall be free from all blame respecting this matter."

This letter accounts for its being, unexpectedly to me, made a secret in Boston that I had sent the letters. The gentleman to whom I sent them had his reasons for desiring not to be known as the person who received and communicated them; but as this would have been suspected, if it were known that I sent them, that circumstance was to be kept a secret. AcVOL. I. Ii

cordingly they were given to another, to be by him produced by the committee.z

My answer to this was of July 25th, 1773, as follows: "I am favored with yours of June 14th, containing some copies of the resolves of the committee upon the letters. I see by your account of the transaction, that you could not well prevent what was done. As to the report of other copies being come from England, I think that could not be. It was an expedient to disengage the house. I hope the possession of the

z When Dr. Franklin put in his answer to the bill in Chancery, which had been filed against him in the name of Mr. Whately, he demurred to two of the interrogatories which it contained, and by which he was required to name the person in England from whom he had received the let ters in question, and also the person in America to whom they had by him been transmitted; and declined making any disclosure of their names. This demurrer was however overruled; and he was ordered to answer these interrogatories: but feeling that his doing so would be a violation of his engagement to the person from whom he had received the letters, and probably injurious to the person to whom they had been sent, he thought it incumbent on him to return to America, and thereby avoid the breach of his engagement, and he appears to have done this conscientiously; and so completely, that the person from whom the letters were received, was never ascertained; nor were any of the conjectures respecting that person founded upon, or suggested by any infidelity or indiscretion on the part of Dr. Franklin. He was not however under an equal obligation to secrecy, in regard to the person to whom the letters were immediately transmitted; and he therefore confidentially informed a friend of his, (Dr. Bancroft, to whom the editor is indebted for this note) that they had been sent to Mr. Cushing, then speaker of the house of representatives of the Massachusetts' Bay; with whom it was Dr. Frank. lin's duty, as agent for the assembly of that province, to correspond:a fact now ascertained in his PRIVATE CORRESPONDENCE, Part II., and which there is no longer any motive for concealing.

a Men sometimes think it allowable to act improperly for what they consider as good purposes. This was done at Boston, in regard to the let ters under consideration:--a publication of these letters was deemed of the highest importance, by the leading members of the house of represen tatives; and copies of them were therefore made unwarrantably; and these, the late Mr. Hancock was induced to bring forward in that house, of which he was a member, and to declare that they had been sent to him from England; a declaration which could not have been true.

eriginals, and the proceedings upon them will be attended with salutary effects to the province, and then I shall be well pleased. I observe what you mention, that no person besides Dr. Cooper and one of the committee knew they came from me. I did not accompany them with any request of being myself concealed, for believing what I did, to be in the way of my duty as agent, though I had no doubt of its giving offence, not only to the parties exposed, but to administration here, I was regardless of the consequences. However, since the letters themselves are now copied and printed, contrary to the promise I made, I am glad my name has not been heard on the occasion, and as I do not see it could be of any use to the public, I now wish it may continue unknown, though I hardly expect it. As to yours, you may rely on my never mentioning it, except that I may be obliged to shew your letter in my own vindication, to the person only who might otherwise think he had reason to blame ME for breach of engagement."

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With the abovementioned letter of the 14th of June, I received one from another of the gentlemen to whom the papers had been communicated, which says, " By whom and to whom they were sent is still a secret, known only to three persons here, and may still remain so if you desire it." My answer to him of July 25th, was, " I accompanied them with no restriction relating to myself: my duty to the province as their agent I thought required the communication of them so far as I could. I was sensible I should make enemies there, and perhaps might offend government here; but these apprehensions I disregarded. I did not expect, and hardly still expect, that my sending them could be kept a secret. But since it is such hitherto, I now wish it may continue so, because the publication of the letters, contrary to my engagement, has changed the circumstances.-His reply to this of the 10th of November, is, "After all the solicitous inquiries of the governor and his friends respecting his letters, it still remains a secret from and to whom they were sent here. This is known among us, to two only besides myself; and will re

main undiscovered, unless further intelligence should come from your side the water, than I have reason to think has yet been obtained. I cannot, however, but admire your honest openness in this affair, and noble negligence of any inconve niencies that might arise to yourself in this essential service to our injured country."

To another friend I wrote of the same date, July 25th, what will show the apprehensions I was constantly under of the mischiefs that might attend a breach from the exasperated state of things, and the arguments I used to prevent it, viz. "I am glad to see that you are elected into the council, and are about to take part in our public affairs. Your abilities, integrity, and sober attachment to the liberties of our country, will be of great use at this tempestuous time, in conducting our little bark into a safe harbor. By the Boston newspapers, there seem to be among us some violent spirits who are for an immediate rupture. But I trust the general prudence of our countrymen will see, that by our growing strength we advance fast to a situation in which our claims must be allowed; that by a premature struggle we may be crippled and kept down another age; that as between friends every affront is not worth a duel, and between nations every injury is not worth a war, so between the governed and the governing, every mistake in government, every encroachment on rights is not worth a rebellion: 'tis, in my opinion, sufficient for the present, that we hold them forth on all occasions, not giving up any of them, using at the same time every means to make them generally understood and valued by the people; cultivating a harmony among the colonies, that their union in the same sentiments may give them greater weight; remembering withal that this Protestant country (our mother, though of late an unkind one) is worth preserving, and that her weight in the scale of Europe, her safety in a great degree, may depend on our union with her. Thus conducting, I am confident, we may within a few years, obtain every allowance of, and every security for, our inestimable privileges, that we can wish or desire."-His answer of Dec.

31st, is, "I concur perfectly with you in the sentiments expressed in your last. No considerate person, I should think, can approve of desperate remedies, except in desperate cases. The people of America are extremely agitated by the repeated efforts of administration to subject them to absolute power. They have been amused with accounts of the pacific disposition of the ministry, and flattered with assurances that upon their humble petitions all their grievances would be redressed. They have petitioned from time to time; but their petitions have had no other effect than to make them feel more sensibly their own slavery. Instead of redress, every year has produced some new manoeuvre, which could have no tendency but to irritate them more and more. The last measure of the East India company's sending their tea here, subject to a duty, seems to have given the finishing stroke to their patience. You will have heard of the steps taken at Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, to prevent the payment of this duty, by sending the tea back to its owners. But as this was found impossible at Boston, the destruction of the tea was the consequence. What the event of these commotions will be God only knows. The people through the colonies appear immovably fixed in their resolution, that the tea duty shall never be paid; and if the ministry are determined to enforce these measures, I dread the consequences: I verily fear they will turn America into a field of blood. But I will hope for the best."

I am told that administration is possessed of most of my letters sent or received on public affairs for some years past. Copies of them having been obtained from the files of the several assemblies, or as they passed through the post office. I do not condemn their ministerial industry, or complain of it. The foregoing extracts may be compared with those copies; and I can appeal to them with confidence, that upon such comparison these extracts will be found faithfully made. And that the whole tenor of my letters has been, to persuade patience and a careful guarding against all violence, under the grievances complained of, and this from various considerations,