“Will you not have the goodness to show once more to the King how much he can gain, without striking a blow, in this one campaign? And will you not attempt to convince His Majesty that this miserable pittance which they demand, and over which we have been disputing for more than a year, will bring to us all the fruits of a great victory without undergoing the dangers of a combat? That this help can give to us while we sleep, all that the disgraceful treaty of 1763 made us lose? What greater view can occupy the council of the king and what force your pleading will take on if you show the reverse of the picture and count what the defeat of the Americans will cost us. Three hundred millions—our men—our vessels, our islands, etc.... because their forces once united against us, their audacity augmented by their great success, it is only certain that they will force these same Frenchmen to support a fatal war which two millions now would avert. “In spite of the danger which I run in writing these daring things from London, I feel myself twice as much French in London as at Paris. The patriotism of this people stirs my own....” As may be seen from this letter, Arthur Lee still inspired complete confidence in the agent of the French government, so much indeed that Beaumarchais gladly disclosed to him the plans which he had formed for coming to the aid of the Americans. So certain was he that France would ultimately yield to the necessity of giving them secret support that he no doubt spoke with indiscreet assurance on the subject. Exactly what passed between the two men will never be known, but what is certain is, that during the spring of 1776, Arthur Lee addressed to the secret committee of Congress a letter in which he says: “In consequence of active measures taken with the French Embassy in London, _M. de Vergennes has sent me a secret agent to inform me that the French court cannot think of making war on England but that she is ready to send five million worth of arms and ammunition to Cap Français to be thence sent to the colonies._” A careful analysis of this important missive will at once make clear the profound misunderstanding which arose in the mind of the secret committee of Congress regarding the true state of affairs in France. So completely was every statement perverted that though the whole bears a semblance of truth yet in reality nothing could be further removed from it. For instead of sending an agent to confer with Arthur Lee, M. de Vergennes had steadily refused to enter into any relation whatever with him. Instead of promising munitions of war for which Beaumarchais had been pleading so long and so ardently, the government continued to refuse to compromise itself by making any statement regarding them.