There are two other sources from which foreigners have made great profits. The difference between bills of exchange and silver. During the whole of our history, when a man could readily get twentyfive paper dollars for one in silver, he could not get more than twelve paper dollars for one, in a bill of exchange. Nearly this proportion was observed all along, as I have been informed. The Agent of a foreign merchant had only to sell his goods for paper, or buy paper with silver at twentyfive for one, and immediately go and buy bills at twelve for one. So that he doubled his money in a moment. Another source was this; the paper money was not alike depreciated in all places at the same time. It was forty for one at Philadelphia, sometimes, when it was only twenty at Boston. The agent of a foreign merchant had only to sell his goods, or send silver to Philadelphia, and exchange it for paper, which he could lay out at Boston for twice what it cost him, and in this way again double his property. This depreciating paper currency being, therefore, such a fruitful source for men of penetration to make large profits, it is not to be wondered that some have written alarming letters to their correspondents. No man is more ready than I am to acknowledge the obligations we are under to France; but the flourishing state of her marine and commerce, and the decisive influence of her councils and negotiations in Europe, which all the world will allow to be owing in a great measure to the separation of America from her inveterate enemy, and to her new connexions with the United States, show that the obligations are mutual. And no foreign merchant ought to expect to be treated in America better than her native merchants, who have hazarded their property through the same perils of the seas and of enemies.