I have now the Honor of communicating to your Excellency a Copy of certain Instructions I have recd. from Congress, dated the 28 May 1781;1 and which were included in the Dispatches which your Excellency was so obliging as to deliver to me the Evening before the last, viz2

“It is their Instruction that you continue to acknowledge on all suitable occasions, the grateful Impressions made on these States by the friendly Disposition manifested towards them by his Catholic Majesty: and particularly by the Proofs given of it in the Measures which he has taken, and which it is hoped he will further take, for preserving their Credit, and for aiding them with a Supply of Cloathing for their army.”

“You are also authorized and instructed to disavow in the most positive & explicit Terms any secret understanding or negociation between the United States & great Britain.—to assure his Catholic Majesty that such Insinuations have no other Source than the insidious Designs of the common Enemy, and that as the United States have the highest Confidence in the Honor and good Faith, both of his most Christian and his Catholic Majesty, so it is their inviolable Determination to take no Step which shall depart in the smallest Degree from their Engagements with either.”3

It gives me Pleasure to observe that these Instructions confirm in the fullest Manner the assurances and Professions I have heretofore made to your Excellency respecting the Sentiments and Dispositions of the United States, and I flatter myself that his Majesty will be pleased to consider the assurances they contain as recieving unquestionable Proofs from the offer I have already made to confirm them by Deeds no less important to the Interests than I hope consistent with the Views and Desires of his Majesty.

I cannot omit this occasion of presenting my Congratulations on the Success of his Majesty’s arms at Pensacola.4 This Event cannot fail of being followed by important Consequences, and may perhaps induce the Enemy to expect greater advantages from concluding a reasonable Peace, than continuing to protract an unrighteous war.

Having understood, shortly after recieving my Letters from Your Excellency, that the Court had also recd. Dispatches from Philadelphia, I presumed that the communication of any Gazettes from thence (which indeed contain all the Intelligence I have) would be useless, and therefore did not send them, but on considering that it was possible that the Papers I had, might be of later Date than those which your Excellency might otherwise recieve, I now take the Liberty of enclosing two which contain Accounts somewhat interesting.5 If they should be new to your Excellency, I beg that their not being sooner sent, will recieve an apology from the abovementioned Circumstance, and that your Excellency will remain assured of the perfect Respect and Consideration with which I have the Honor to be Your Excellency’s most obedient & most h’ble Servant,