I have the honor to be, with perfect attachment, Sir, your most obedient
and most humble servant,
Durival.
_Extract of a letter from Benjamin Franklin to Mr. Grand, banker at
Paris, dated Philadelphia, July the 11th, 1786_.
'I send you enclosed some letters that have passed between the Secretary
of Congress and me, respecting three millions of livres acknowledged to
have been received before the treaty of 1778, as _don gratuit_, from the
King, of which only two millions are found in your accounts; unless
the million from the Fanners General be one of the three. I have been
assured that all the money received from the King, whether as loan or
gift, went through your hands; and as I always looked on the million we
had of the Farmers General to be distinct from what we had of the crown,
I wonder how I came to sign the contract acknowledging three millions
of gift, when in reality there were only two, exclusive of that from
the Farmers. And as both you and I examined the project of the contract
before I signed it, I am surprised that neither of us took notice of
the error. It is possible that the million furnished ostensibly by the
Farmers, was in fact a gift of the crown, in which case, as Mr. Thomson
observes, they owe us for the two ship-loads of tobacco they received
on account of it.
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