_P. S._ As well as I can collect from the foreign papers, they have passed a bill in England to enable the King to commit to _any_ prison such persons as he _suspects_ of favoring America, and to fix the crime of piracy on all those who are taken at sea with your commission. In some former resolution, you declared that retaliation should be made on those, who were suspected of favoring the measures of the British Government in the States; and hitherto the American privateers have permitted the subjects of Great Britain to depart in peace. Our enemies are determined to show how unworthy they are of such lenity, as several individuals besides Captain Ross have done. They will compel you to make it a war of revenge, not of redress. It would not, I think, be difficult to negotiate a loan of money for the States of Virginia and South Carolina, through the Havanna; if you think this would be useful, please to give your directions in it by the first opportunity. The present disposition to oblige us may not last forever. A. L. [14] At the bottom of this letter, and of the Memorial to the Court of Spain, Mr Lee signs himself, “_Commissioner Plenipotentiary from the Congress of the United States of America_.” But this must have been for the greater formality, as he had not yet received any appointment to Spain from Congress, but only went there by the advice of the Commissioners in Paris. See p. 40, of this volume. FROM B. FRANKLIN TO ARTHUR LEE. Passy, March 21st, 1777. Dear Sir, We have received your favors from Vitoria and Burgos. The Congress sitting at Baltimore despatched a packet to us the 9th of January, containing an account of the success at Trenton, and subsequent events to that date, as far as they had come to knowledge. The vessel was obliged to run up a little river in Virginia to avoid some men of war, and was detained there seventeen days, or we should have had these advices sooner. We learn however through England, where they have news from New York to the 4th of February, that in Lord Cornwallis’s retreat to New Brunswick two regiments of his rear guard were cut to pieces; that General Washington having got round him to Newark and Elizabethtown, he had retired to Amboy in his way to New York; that General Howe had called in the garrisons of Fort Lee and Fort Constitution, which were now possessed by our people; that on the New York side, Forts Washington and Independence were retaken by our troops, and that the British forces at Rhode Island were recalled for the defence of New York.