Your favour of the 3d inst: in consequence of my absence from town was not recieved ‘till Yesterday. the draft which it covered on the 13^th of Virga. for $803 32/100 payable in North Carolina Bank Notes. was duly honoured, and in complyance with your request have exchanged the same for U. States Bank paper and deposited the note proceeds as $PR statement annexed— Say Seven hunded & seventy six Dollars 86/100 to your Credit in the Bank of the United States as you will find by the Cashr’s certificate above. I am with the highest respect Your obt serv.

I had the pleasure this morning of recieving your favour of the 20th. I am heartily rejoiced at hearing of any proposition to print a 2d. Edition of the Life of Washington as it is one of the most desirable objects I have in this life to publish a corrected edition of that work.

I was about to sit down to give you an account of my autumnal Circuit, when I had the pleasure of receiving your late letter— Before I say one word on this subject, I beg to apologize for not acknowleging before the barrel of hams which you sent me— The barrel of hams safely arrived at Boston, & there by the carelessness of the Captain or Consignee or both, it was left on the wharf for a day or two, & thus all were stolen except five— These I received & they were so good that I regretted extremely my loss—& a

     I am prevented returning you the Bond sent me, to day, not having any one here to witness it so soon as this can be done it will be forwarded to you— Our man Dennis has taken shelter in Alexandria & it appears from the Constables account he cannot be brought out by a Warrant from this State, altho it appears his mistress i[s] l[i]ving in Faerfax County, the Constable say he could not get a Magistrate in Town to grant him a Warrant, that the Governor of this S[t]ate could only take him out— What think you of this, When you have leisure

Agreeable to an order of the Prest. & managers of the Dismal Swamp Land Company, I have made a special deposit, in the Virginia Bank at Norfolk, of your dividend, which with all others, consists alone in North Carolina Bank notes, the only money received by our Agent. Hereafter, I beg you will be good enough to appoint an Agent in Norfolk with authority to receive your dividends, which will be made in the month of November of each year. This will be more agreeable to me, as it will rid me of the necessity of having Bank accounts.

I thank you for the opinion you have been so good as to give me in the case on which I consulted you. I have from the first thought it doubtful but shall decide it in conformity with your opinion.

     My very particular and honored friend and relative Lt Govr Phillips, with his lady and daughter contemplate a visit to Washington & its vicinity. They will probably pay their respects to you at Mount Vernon; in which case, I wish to introduce them to your acquaintance and attentions.

I have not heard from you since you set out for Philadelphia, but I hope your health has not at any rate been injured by your attention on your circuit duties.

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.

     In answer to your friendly letter of the 12 of Decr, I mentioned that this was not the country for my profession; and am every day more convinced of the necessity & importance to my interest, and to the highest object that can attract my attention in a temporal point of view of returning to that State where I met with encouragement in my profession, & great civility in my social intercourse with an enlighten & polished people.

     I received yours My dear Sir of the 12th of Decr and am happy to hear from you & your family. It is but a poor consolation to tell you, that I sympathize with you for your late distresses, and that I have a deep sense of your friend & relations Calamity. It is nevertheless all that human weakness can do; and to do any thing more we must have recourse to a superior tribunal, to one, that I feel unworthy to approach. It is to that source I am now convinced we ought to address ourselves; to the comforter of the afflicted, and the protector of the weak.

I am grieved to learn by your late letter of your continued indisposition— I heard in the autumn quite by accident of your sickness at Philadelphia; but I presumed it was temporary. I most earnestly hope & pray that a good Providence will restore you to health & enable you to attend at the February Term. I shall feel quite lost <illegible> without you; & must say in all sincerity & frankness that I know not in whose judgment I have implicit a reliance, as in yours.

I thank you for the kind solicitude expressed in your letter of the 3d.

I had imprudently mounted a young horse who started & threw me as I was riding him to my farm. I was much hurt but no bone was broken & I shall be able to attend the court at Raleigh to which place I shall set out the day after tomorrow.

     In fulfilment of my promise I return the letters to General Washington which you were so obliging as to forward to me. I should have done it sooner but that I had hoped to return at the same time the letters expected from Richmond. Will you permit me to recall your attention to the latter portion (which I believe will comprize the letters I could most wish to obtain) that the Chief Justice may not lose the opportunity of a recess for looking them up.

While at Mount Vernon I delivered you the affidavit of T. Marshall stating that he never received the certificate which you were so obliging as to obtain for him & I now enclose you mine that I have lost it. I have no doubt that they will be sufficient to obtain the renewal of the certificate; but I believe that some bond must be executed before it can issue. I do not know how this is to be filled up & suppose it must contain a description of the certificate which I cannot make.

Your favour of the 1st inst. came to hand by the last Mail. I concur in the Opinion that the question is sufficiently doubtful to warrant the parties concerned, in acceding to the compromise proposed by Mr Banks, & that the property in contest is not of sufficient value to incur expensive litigation.

     I wrote to you by the last mail enclosing the right hand halves of the notes belonging to the parts which you will find herein, and all of which I wish safe to hand. Respectully yr most obt sert

     The Dismal Swamp Land Company convened on the 15th, Inst., declared a dividend of $222 on each quarter share of stock in that Company— Enclosed you will receive your drafts for the dividend on the shares of the Estate of Genl Geo. Washington— You will perceive by the endorsement on the smaller draft, that payments have been made the Co. in various Notes of Banks, other then those of Virginia: this is unavoidable, from the manner in which sale of the lumber of the Co.

I have received your letter requesting to know whether I had formed an opinion on the case which was remanded to the circuit court of Pennsylvania. I regret that I had not formed one. It would give me pleasure to communicate it to you.

     As a Specimen of their best edition of the Bible from American Stereotype plates, and as a small token of their respect, the managers of the American Bible Society request you to accept the Copy which accompanies this communication.

     I en[c]lose two letters for your perusal and advice[.] the one from Diggs, the matter referd to, I have not the smallest recollection of, and am fully persuaded it is only a trick, upon a supposition that rather than such a matter should be brought into court the Executors will relinquish the claim, the Wheat charged to him & which he says was an exchange of seed and, delivered to Hyland Crow an overseer of the Genls must be false, Hyland Crow lived with the Genl in the year 1796 and left him in the fall of the same, at this time Mr P

     In the Ejectment of the exrs of Genl Washington vs: Homertree & in the suit of the same against the same for cent, Judgements were confessed at May Court Cast with a stay of execution in each case untill the first of December— Since the first of december, I have written twice to the clerk of the Superior Court of Fairfax to issue executions— Which I exect he has done & that they are now in the hands of the Sheriff— If the executions have not been issued, the court will do so on your or Major Lewis’s application for them— You

     Your Communication my friend I with great pleasure received a few days ago a private Convayance offers Me an Oppertunity of makeing you my thanks for it, and of sending you a few Yellow beet sead, it is a new species in our gardens and they are very delicate.

     I recd in due time your favor of Sepr 14 and have delayed acknowledging it, till you should have returned from your autumnal Circuit. Presuming this to have taken place. I now offer my thanks for your ready assent to my request of August & particularly for your politeness in referring to myself the mode of attaining its object. The one which will probably give you the least trouble; will be to have the papers in question Deposited with Mr R. Catto, under an address to me & to be forwarded by some safe hand.