From Benjamin Franklin to Jacques Brillon de Jouy, 16 February 1785
To Jacques Brillon de Jouy3
Press copy of copy:4 American Philosophical Society
à Passy ce 16 Fevr. 1785.
Mr. Franklin fait mille Compliments à Monsieur Brillon. Il lui envoie selon sa Promesse l’Extrait de la Lettre que M. Bache lui a écrite, au quel il a joint une Traduction, et le prie de vouloir bien les remettre à M. Thomas.
3. Who served as an intermediary between the abbe Thomas (who had grievances against JW and the firm of Bache & Shee) and BF. For background on this tangle see XLII, 227–9; RB to BF, Aug. 28, above.
4. This brief letter from BF is the first item in a longer MS copied by L’Air de Lamotte. Beneath BF’s letter is the French translation of the extract BF enclosed, taken from RB’s letter of Aug. 28. L’Air de Lamotte noted in the margin that this translation was sent on Feb. 17 to the abbe de St. Non, to relay to Thomas. Following that is a two-page extract of a letter from Thomas to St. Non, dated March 11, 1785: Thomas argues that he has not received enough from Bache & Shee to break even, questions the firm’s assertion that due payment had already been made (his suspicions on this point having been bolstered by an unnamed American merchant he had met at a dinner party), and complains that it has been three years since JW first promised his account would be immediately forthcoming.