PARIS, January 14, 1787.
SIR,--I have been honored with your letter of October 15, and thank you
for the intelligence it contained. I am able to make you but an unequal
return for it, your friends here being so much more in condition to
communicate to you interesting intelligence. With respect to the
affairs of Holland, they do not promise arrangement. The interest which
the King of Prussia takes in the affairs of the Stadtholder, seem to
threaten an interruption of his cordiality with the country. The
misunderstanding between the Kings of Spain and Naples, and a projected
visit of the latter to Vienna, with the known influence of his Queen
over him, are matter for some jealousy.
As to domestic news, the Assembly of Notables occupies all
conversation. What will be the subjects of their deliberation is not
yet declared. The establishment of provincial assemblies, tolerating
the Protestant religion, removing the internal barriers to the
frontiers, equalizing the Gabelles, sale of the King's domains, and, in
short, every other possible reformation, are conjectured by different
persons. I send you a pamphlet on the last Assembly of Notables, from
which ideas are formed as to what this will be. Possibly you may
receive the same from some of your friends. I send you, also, what it
is less likely you should get from them, because it is next to
impossible to get it at all--that is, a late memoir by Linquet, which
has produced his perpetual exile from this country. To these I add a
report written by M. Bailly, on the subject of the Hotel-Dieu of Paris,
which has met a very general approbation. These are things for the day
only. I recollect no work of any dignity which has been lately
published. We shall very soon receive another volume on Mineralogy from
M. de Buffon; and a third volume of the "Cultivator Américain" is in
the press. So is a History of the American War, by a Monsieur Soulés,
the two first volumes of which, coming down to the capture of Burgoyne,
I have seen, and think better than any I have seen. Mazzei will print
soon two or three volumes 8vo. of "Recherches Historiques and
Politiques sur les Etats Unis d'Amérique," which are sensible. We are
flattered with the hopes that the packet boats will hereafter sail
monthly from Havre, the first being to sail on the 10th of the next
month. This is very desirable indeed, as it will furnish more frequent
opportunities of correspondence between the two countries. If I can be
made useful to you in any line whatever here, it will make me very
happy. Being with sincere esteem and respect, Sir, your most obedient,
and most humble servant.