I anxiously desired to converse with you before you left the neighbourhood on the subject of this most ruinous and distressing debt, but circumstances have occur'd to prevent our meeting— I wou'd see you to day but the health of my little boy is too precarious for me to leave him,¹

"...I want half a dozen copies of my history of the colonies, and as I wish to dispose of three or four in Washington, one to your brother Todd should he join us, I shall be much obliged by your putting them in your baggage."

I owe you an apology for not having returned an earlier answer to your letter of the 20th June. The truth is, that at the time I recd it, and another from brother Thompson, I was engaged in a piece of business which required dispatch, & which induced me to postpone my answers to a period when it would be more in my power to reflect upon the decisions which you & he had made & to examine cases. But before that period had arrived our domestic misfortunes commenced.

I reached this place yesterday after a very fatiguing journey, & found all our brethren well, & all of them joining me in sincere regrets for your indisposition. However unwilling we may be to lose your aid, we all think that it would be madness to encounter the hazard of joining us, unless your health should be entirely restored. We hope, however, that you are improving, & will continue to improve, so that you may, after the earth & Atmosphere shall become dry, favor us with a short visit.