From Benjamin Franklin to Pierres, 11 June 1783
To Pierres
AL (draft): American Philosophical Society
Passy, June 11. 1783—
Sir,
I received the Exemplaire of the Constitutions.9 I intended to have waited on M. le Garde des Sceaux yesterday at Versailles, but was prevented.—I shall write to him today.—1 The Ratification of the Swedish Treaty is arrived,2 so that there is no farther Obstruction to the Publication. I desire to have 50 of the 8vos [octavos] bound in Calf, & Letter’d, and 50 half bound, that is, between Pasteboards, with a Sheepskin Back & Letter’d, but not cut. I desire also 6 of the 4tos [quartos] bound in Morocco.3 I am with great Esteem, Sir,
M. Pierres
9. Which Pierres sent on June 7, above.
1. He did so; see Miromesnil to BF, June 16.
2. BF must have learned this from Staël von Holstein at Versailles the day before; see that minister’s letter to BF, June 13.
3. Pierres printed the quarto edition first, identifying the paper as either “Papier d’Annonay, de la Fabrique de MM. Johannot” or “Papier-Vélin, de la Fabrique de M. Réveillon, à Courtalin, en Brie.” For the octavo edition, printed on ordinary paper, he reset the title page and corrected certain typographical errors including the spelling of New Hampshire on the half-title: Durand Echeverria, “French Publications of the Declaration of Independence and the American Constitutions, 1776–1783,” Bibliographical Soc. of America Papers, XLVII (1953), 318–19.