University of Virginia Library

TO EDMUND RANDOLPH.[1]

Dear Sir,—I have at length the pleasure of presenting
you with certain, though not official, intelligence
of the recognition of our Independence by the
States General. This event, with other interesting
particulars, is contained in the enclosed gazettes.
Among its salutary consequences to this country, I
hope the people of Virginia will not be inattentive to
its influence on the value of its staple, on which it is
very probable speculations will be attempted.

The language and measures of the present Administration
will furnish you with copious matter for reflection.
If we had received fewer lessons of caution
against sanguine expectations, I should, with confidence,
explain them by a scheme for a general pacification,
and for fathering on their predecessors all the
obnoxious conditions which the public distresses may
expose them to. If this solution were a just one, it
ought, at the same time, to be remembered that the
triumph of Rodney may give a new turn to their politics.
It appears, from the paper from which the enclosed
intelligence is republished, that this event had
reached London; that it was received with great rejoicings;
but that the public were still haunted with
fears for Jamaica. Other articles, not included in the
paper herewith sent, are the capture of one, if not two,
French seventy-fours, with a number of transports for
the East Indies, by Admiral Barrington; the capture
of a British frigate, with some transports, by a Dutch
ship of war; the capture of the valuable Island of
Ceylon, from the Dutch, by Admiral Hughes; and
of Negapatam, another of their important possessions,
on the coast of Coromandel, with two ships, richly
freighted with spices and other oriental productions.
Ireland is likely to be indulged in every thing. In
addition to a free trade and a free legislation, they
have obtained the assent of the Lord Lieutenant to
an Act of Parliament for emancipating the Catholics
from their shackles on their religious rights, and on
their tenures of real property. Your philanthropy
will be gratified by my adding, as other proofs of

the progress of light and freedom, the abolition of
the inquisitorial jurisdiction in Sicily—the only part
of the Neapolitan dominions where it was in force—
and the inefficiency of the Pope's visit to Vienna in
checking the liberal innovations of the Emperor in
his ecclesiastical polity. * * *

General Washington is still here. I have nothing
to add to my last on the subject of Lippencot and
Asgill.