Towards the end of 1777, the abbé Raynal calling on Dr. Franklin found,
in company with the doctor, their common friend, Silas Deane. “Ah!
monsieur l’abbé,” said Deane, “we were just talking of you and your
works. Do you know that you have been very ill served by some of those
people who have undertaken to give you information on American affairs?”
The abbé resisted this attack with some warmth; and Deane supported it
by citing a variety of passages from Raynal’s works, which he alleged to
be incorrect. At last they came to the anecdote of “Polly Baker,” on
which the abbé had displayed a great deal of pathos and sentiment. “Now
here,” says Deane, “is a tale in which there is not one word of truth.”
Raynal fired at this, and asserted that he had taken it from an
authentic memoir received from America. Franklin, who had amused himself
hitherto with listening to the dispute of his friends, at length
interposed, “My dear abbé,” said he, “shall I tell you the truth? When I
was a young man, and rather more thoughtless than is becoming at our
present time of life, I was employed in writing for a newspaper; and, as
it sometimes happened that I wanted genuine materials to fill up my
page, I occasionally drew on the stores of my imagination for a tale
which might pass current as a reality--now this very anecdote of Polly
Baker was one of my inventions.”