Your friendship will induce you not only to pardon this protracted answer to your favor by Mr Bartram, but to regret the cause of it, when I inform you that I am Just recovering from a severe bilious attack, which succeeded a distressing dyspectical state of my stomach, which really unfitted me for business of every kind.

     I this day read a letter from you to Angela Lewis, dated in April last, in which you complain of the silence of your relations, and express a fear of having been forgotten by them.  I freely acknowledge that I have been hitherto obnoxious to your charge of neglect, so far as my silence may be considered as an evidence of it; but your apprehension of being unremembered by you<r> immediate family, or by myself, is, I can assure you entirely unfounded. You are often the subject of our conversation, as much oftner of our thoughts.

     Your letter of the 14th Decr last in which you stated that Mr [Poor] of Washington would have funds in his hands which shd be paid² one of us & not the balance of³ your debt to the estate should be observed thro one of the banks I paid to us, induced⁴ us to hope that we shd be spared⁵ the necessity of again calling your attention to this matter.

     I have received your letter of the 16th, in which you communicate the unanimous wish of the Anti-Jackson Corresponding Committee for Fairfax county, that I would allow myself to be considered a member of that body.

     I beg you to accept my thanks for "the Memoir" relating to your unsettled claims upon the government of the U. S. which I have read with much interest, and with my former opinion of the Justice of those claims more fully confirmed.

     Believe me to be with very great respect, and with best wishes for your happiness, Dear Sir Your Mo. ob. Servt

In court, & on the verge of a trial, I can only state my dear sir that you have been correctly informed as to my prohibition of steam boat parties to M. V.— it has been made public for more than 3 years & was repeated more than 12 months ago. Of the necessity of the measure I could satisfy you in a few minutes, as well as of the propriety of adhering to it without making exceptions in any case. The fact is that a single dispensation would be equivalent to a total revocation.

     My worthy friend Mrs Blodget of this City has a claim against the U.S. which either has been, or probably will be soon sent from the H. of R. to the Senate. The provision made for her by the bill is small, but it will, with economy, afford her necessary comforts, and preserve her from utter ruin.

     Mr Myers will oblige me by sending me 20 bushels cotton seed (green seed) to the care of A. C. Cazenove & Co, & he will please inform me the price that the amount may be remitted to him. It ought to be in Alexa. in abt March, as I presume it must be planted in April.

     I suggested to Mr Caldwell during his life time that a friendly suit should be brought by the representatives of Mr Blodget agt the chief Justice & myself, stating the failure of the objects for which the trust was credited, our refusal to accept the trust, & praying a transfer of the Stock to such representatives, or the substitution of other trustees. This I still think is the best, if not the only plan to be pursued. We will put in an answer immediately submitting the whole case to the Court. Believe me to be Dear Sir very sincerely & respectfully yrs

The Chief Justice informs me that you are to draw the opinion in the Case of Bell & Wilkins &c. I stated to him that a night's reflection had induced me to change my opinion as to the Kentucky decisions, being now of opinion that they go further than I at first supposed they did.

     My recent indisposition, from <mutilated> I have not entirely recovered, has prevented me <mutilated> reading as attentively as I wished, and shall <mutilated> book which you were so kind as to send m<e> <mutilated> for which I beg you to accept my most sincere <mutilated> I observe however and admire the design & philos<ophy> of the work, and have no doubt of the ability <mutilated> which it is executed.

     Wrote to Mrs Eliza. T. Hove Executrix of Ja. H. Hove to enquire when we may expect payt. of Ja. H. Hoves bond dated 29 May 1822 paybl. in 5 years from date given to David & Sam. Wilson for $1325 & assigned to Major Lewis & myself.

     She lives near Mr Frobels at a place called The village.

It is about a week since I returned home, the session of the Phila. Court having been abridged by a severe rheumatic attack, which confined me to the house for many days prior to my departure. I have seldom, on any circuit, tried so few cases as on the last, and few of them were either new or difficult.  Such as are at all interesting, I will now proceed to state.

I recd your letter of the 2d inst. in Phila. but was prevented, by a severe indisposition, from answering it from that place, and even now, I can do no more than repeat the undiminished confidence I feel in your ability to execute the work in the best possible manner, and in your fidelity to bring it out in a way most¹ advantageous for the pecuniary interest of the parties concerned consistently with our contract —

     I wrote you a letter about 10 days past which the messenger left at the Atheneum for you. Please inform me if you recd it. Very sincerely yrs

     The enclosed letter is from a much esteemed friend, but he could not have addressed it to any person who has it less in his power to make the enquiries he wishes. I have after some days deliberation thought of applying to you for information, well knowing your benevolence & readiness to oblige others. Should you not have it in your power to aid my enquiries, have the goodness to return me the letter with your advice as to some other application.

Your favor of the 25th inst., recd today, induces me to do immediately what I had mentally arranged to do after my return from Trenton—answer your interesting letter of the 4th July. But first allow me to excuse myself from the censure to which I am apparently obnoxious for having postponed the performance of this duty to this late day. I took that letter out of the office in Alexa.

I have to acknowledge the rect of your letter of the 6th of Augt which, having had to travel after me from Alexandria to this part of the state did not reach me 'till long after its date.

     I have to acknowledge the rect of your letter of the 6th of Augt which having had to trail after me from Alexa. to this part of the state did not reach me till long after its date.

I send you this letter for your information: I recd it this morning. Affecly Yrs

In the midst of my preparations for my Journey to the mountains, on my way to Phila., I set down to inform you that I, this morning, sent up the demijohn of wine, properly Cased, to A. C. Cazenove & Co. Alexandria, to be forwarded by them to Mr Cazenove of Boston for you, from whom you will hear after its arrival.

I duly recd your favor of the 4th from Phila. and within a few days thereafter, I had the balance of the papers packed in a box, and sent to Alexandria, where they arrived Just in time to be put on board to the schooner Alexandria as she was leaving the wharf. I shall not feel entirely at ease until I hear of the safe arrival of both parcels, which be so good as to announce to me as soon as the event is known. 

Since the date of my last letter to you I have been led to a more critical examination of the question which arises in the case of the Post master general vs Reeder viz if the plea offers no legal bar to the action what Judgment is to be rendered? than I had before taken, and the difficulties which attend it, instead of being cleared away, have thickened upon me, so that I feel more at a loss than I ever was in my life upon any other question to come to a satisfactory conclusion.

Under the act of the 5th of June 1794, for punishment of certain crimes, the ship "Union,"¹ which had been fitted as a privateer in James river, was arrested by due process of law, in consequence of special orders of President Washington to Henry Lee Governor of Virginia, the conduct of Mr David M. Randolph, Marshal of that district, was on that occasion approved of by Genl Washington, as signified by him in a letter to Governor Lee about the month of July or Augt 1794, and his thanks to the marshal were communicated to him accordingly by the Governor.

     I return you many thanks for your letter of the 12th, which was forwarded to me from Philadelphia since I left that place. You have stated precisely that part of the opinion in the case of the U.S. vs. Nicoll which I had forgotten & was anxious to see. It fully sanctions the opinion which I had prepared in the post office case, viz that the giving of a new bond with new sureties by the deputies, in consequence of a requisition of the P. M. G.