Please permit me, my dear and venerable Doctor, to ask for news of you; as we are far from each other, let me at least find out how you are and if sometimes you think about the person most full of feelings of the tenderest attachment and the deepest veneration. I cannot forget the touching kindness with which you have thought of a way to come and embellish my solitude which you have already blessed. I have thought of nothing but making it easier for you to do so. I have found a suitable yacht which you will be able to use if you warn me several days in advance so that it will be in tiptop shape. It belongs to Mr. de la Ferté des Meuns, and he will be at your disposition as well as his boatmen from whom I even found out the price so that you would not be so burdened: they charge sixty livres for the round trip. They could take you to Epinay, which is less than a league from my house where I would be ready to receive you. Although you would have to walk to my home, there would be a house halfway where you could stop to rest and have tea. If you went by boat to Argenteuil, you would only have to walk about half as far but you would have to climb a bit, and the path is harder on the feet. My dear Doctor, you would have to come next month as I am leaving Sanois in the month of July to travel, and furthermore it would be too hot by then and the countryside less beautiful. You need only tell me what day you wish to leave and return; you must stay several days with me, if possible a week or more. Ah! My dear Doctor, how sad I shall be if I have been merely dreaming. I leave it to your goodness, your prudence, your understanding that I do not wish to have the biggest pleasure of my life at the cost of exposing you to the slightest inconvenience. Thus decide my fate, my dear Doctor, and whatever it may be, remember the tender friendship and the esteem of the one who writes you in particular and the respect and gratitude she shares with everyone else.

Permit me to commend myself to the care and memories of Mr. Franklin, your grandson, who will come with you, I hope. I would be delighted if you also brought along the young grandson whom I saw at your home, whose charming face is already adorned with such a fine character of sincerity and freedom.