I received a kind Letter from you lately which gave me the Pleasure of being inform’d that you are well. I am glad you have made the Provision against the Winter which I mentioned to you. Your Bill is honour’d. It is impossible for me always to guess what you may want, and I hope therefore that you will never be shy in letting me know where I can help to make your Life more comfortable.

It was my Intention to have declin’d serving another Year as President that I might be at Liberty to take a Trip to Boston in the Spring; but I submit to the unanimous Voice of my Country, which has again placed me in the Chair. I have now been upwards of Fifty Years employ’s in public Offices. When I inform’d your good Friend Dr. Cooper that I was order’d to France being then 70 Years old, and observ’d that the Publick having as it were eaten my Flesh, seem’d now resolv’d to pick my Bones; he replied that he approv’d their taste for that the nearer the Bone the sweeter the Meat. I must own that it is no small Pleasure to me, and I suppose it will give my Sister Pleasure, that after such long Trial of me, I should be elected a third Time by my Fellow Citizens, without a dissenting Vote but my own, to fill the most honourable Post in their Power to bestow. This universal and unbounded confidence of a whole People; flatters my Vanity much more than a Peerage could do;

“Hung o’er with Ribbons & shuk round with String” may give nominal but not real Honour.

This Family are all well as I also am, Thanks to God. And I am ever, Your affectionate Brother