"Sir;--His Majesty has learned, that the boat of a chebeck, commanded by Don Barthelemi Rosello, having seized a Dutch vessel, named the Spaar, Captain John Tierds Wagenaar, coming out of Gibraltar, where he had unloaded a cargo of flour, which he was carrying from Ferrol to Cadiz; on account of the purveyors of our Marine the said vessel has been set at liberty, upon the declaration which he made, that he had been taken under Cape Espartel, by the English privateer, the Maidstone, who had conducted him to that place. Nevertheless, we have proofs that the vessel has been met at the entrance of the port of Cadiz, having at that time her cargo; that by consequence, her pretended capture by the English privateer is a pure fiction, and the introduction into Gibraltar of a load of five thousand one hundred and sixtytwo and a quarter quintals of castile of flour, a manifest theft committed upon the provisions of the Marine of the King; and to the end that such villanies may be punished and prevented hereafter, his Majesty has ordained, that a prosecution be commenced against the said Wagenaar, and that I give you notice of it, to the end, that you may inform their High Mightinesses, to whom his Minister at the Hague has orders to complain highly of a theft, which ought not to have been the fruit of the complaisance, which the King has used towards the flag of the Republic. I shall add, that his Majesty hopes that their High Mightinesses by the remedy, which they shall provide, and by the severe punishment of the guilty, will spare him the pain of taking himself the precautions necessary to suppress such crying excesses."