I was too much indisposed yesterday to write in answer to your affecting Letter; but I have considered the Case very attentively and will now give you the Result. In the first Place what you demand of me is impracticable, the Sum I have to draw upon in France being but little more than half of what you require, and upon that small Sum, tho’ my late extraordinary Expences in Building have much straitened me in furnishing my ordinary Expences, I dare not draw under the present Circumstances of Affairs in that Country lest thro’ the Lowness of the Funds I should loose perhaps half my Property in selling out to pay the Bills; or in Case of public Bankruptcy, which I find is apprehended by many as a possible Case, my Bills should be returned under a Protest, which besides the Damages, would extremely embarass me. By the last Accounts I received I suffer’d a Loss of 15 Percent in the Sale of my Funds to produce Money for the Payment of a Bill for 10,000 Livres which I sold towards the End of the last Year; and we now learn from the public Prints that the new proposed Loan of 30 Millions does not fill, and that Mr. Neckar is discouraged and in bad Health, which together has occasioned the Funds to fall much lower. In the next Place it seems to me that in your present Circumstances (excuse my Freedom in presuming to give you my Advice) it would be more adviseable for you to remain here a few Months longer in order to finish your affair with the Congress. They meet again in the Beginning of January, and there is no Doubt but the Officers thro’ whose Hands such Affairs must pass, will be present, and your Accounts having been already examined and passed, I am of your Opinion, that they will probably be some of the first paid. Money, I think, will not be wanting, as it is thought the immense Importation of Goods lately made into this Port must produce at least one fourth of the Import expected from the whole of the United States. If you should be absent at the next Meeting of Congress it may occasion a still further Delay of Payment for want of Somebody present to solicit the Business, which would be a further Prejudice to the Creditors. If you should conclude to stay I would write a Letter to your Father, which he might shew to them, expressing that your Stay was by my Counsel, with the Reasons; and that as soon as the Congress should meet I would support your Application for immediate Payment with my strongest Interest. This Delay of two or three Months I should think cannot make much Difference in your Father’s Affairs; the present Disorders of that Country being considered: Or if you apprehend, as you have mentioned, that the Creditors may suspect your having an Intention of assuming to your own Use the Property of your Father, you may, to prevent such Suspicion, offer the Creditors to deliver up to them or to any Person they shall please to appoint all the Papers ascertaining your Father’s Claim upon the Congress; thereby enabling them to solicit for and receive the same. I wish I could give you still better Counsel; but this is what occurs, (in my present Inability of otherwise serving you) to your affectionate Friend