I have received two letters from a Frenchman, settled in one of the ports of Barbary, offering himself to act as our Minister with the Emperor, with whom he pretended to be intimate, and acquainting me that his Imperial Majesty wondered we had never sent to thank him for being the first power on this side of the Atlantic that had acknowledged our independence, and opened his ports to us; advising that we should send the Emperor a present. On inquiry at the office in whose department Africa is included, I learnt the character of this man to be such, that it was not safe to have any correspondence with him, and therefore I did not answer his letters. I suppose Congress has received the memorial we presented to this Court respecting the Barbary States, and requesting the King's good offices with them, agreeable to the treaty; and also the answer, expressing the King's readiness to perform those good offices whenever the Congress should send us instructions, and make provision for the necessary presents;[15] or if those papers have not yet got to hand, they will be found among the copies carried over by Mr Adams, and therefore I only mention them by way of remembrance. Whenever a treaty with the Emperor is intended, I suppose some of our naval stores will be an acceptable present, and the expectation of continued supplies of such stores, a powerful motive for entering into and continuing a friendship. [15] Correspondence of the Commissioners at the Court of France. Vol. I. pp. 431, 453, 462. I should send you copies of several other memorials and public papers; but as Mr Adams goes in the same ship, and has the whole of our transactions during his time, it is not so necessary by this vessel. The disposition of this nation in general continues friendly towards us and our cause, and I do not see the least diminution of it, except among the West India merchants and planters, whose losses have rendered them a little discontented. Spain has been long acting as a mediator, but arming all the time most vigorously. Her naval force is now very great indeed, and as her last proposition of a long truce, in which America should be included and treated as independent in fact, though not expressly acknowledged as such, has been lately rejected by England, it is now thought, that her open junction with France in the war is not far distant. The Commissioners here have a power in general terms to treat of peace, friendship, and commerce with European States, but I apprehend this is scarce explicit enough to authorise me to treat of such a truce, if the proposition should again come upon the _tapis_. I therefore wish the Congress to consider of it, and give such powers as may be necessary to whom they may think proper, that, if a favorable opportunity of making an advantageous treaty should offer, it may not be missed.