"With the most bitter grief I have received advice of the sentence you have passed on the French Settlement at Chandernagore, by which all the buildings, as well of the Company as of private persons, are to be utterly demolished. "Humane and compassionate as you are, Sirs, you would be sensibly affected--were your eyes witnesses to it as mine have been--by the distress to which this order has reduced the hearts of those unhappy inhabitants who remain in that unfortunate place, particularly if you knew that there is nothing left to the majority of them beyond these houses, on whose destruction you have resolved. If I may believe what I hear, the motive which incites you is that of reprisal for what has happened at Cuddalore and Madras: it does not become me to criticize either the conduct of M. Lally, our general, who, by all accounts, is a man very much to be respected by me, or your reasons, which you suppose sufficient. Granting the latter to be so, permit me, Sirs, to address myself to your generosity and humanity, and those admirable qualities, so universally esteemed by mankind, will encourage me to take the liberty to make certain representations. "All upbraidings are odious, and nothing is more just than the French proverb which says, to remind a person of favours done him cancels the obligation. God forbid, Sirs, I should be guilty of this to you or your nation by reminding you for a moment, that these houses, now condemned by you, served you as an asylum in 1756, and that the owners, whom you are now reducing to the greatest distress and are plunging into despair, assisted you to the utmost of their power, and alleviated your misfortunes as much as they were able. But what am I saying? Your nation is too polished to need reminding of what is just. Therefore excuse my saying that this reason alone is sufficient to cancel the law of retaliation which you have resolved to execute, and to make you revoke an order which, I am sure, you could not have given without much uneasiness of mind. I cast myself at your feet, imploring, with the most ardent prayers, that compassion, which I flatter myself I perceive in your hearts, for these poor creatures, whom you cannot without remorse render miserable. If you really, Sirs, think I too have had the happiness to be of some use to you and your nation, whilst Chief at Dacca, and that I have rendered you some services, I only beg that you would recollect them for one moment, and let them induce you to grant the favour I request for my poor countrymen. I shall then regard it as the most happy incident in my life, and shall think myself ten thousand times more indebted to you.