[R] Sir Department of State Sept 12. 1795. Yesterday I received a letter from Governor Fenner, some parts of which, it seems proper to make known to you, as they refer to your Letter of the 17 ult^o of which a Copy had been sent to the Governor: you will find them in the enclosed extracts from his Letter of the 5 curr^t. It was the more proper to communicate those Extracts, seeing in your Letter of the 9 inst, you again — refer to supposed Injuries and Insults to Capt Home, and intimate that, elsewhere, a due allowance will be made for irritations resulting from a series of very unfriendly treatment The Governor denies that either before or since the aggression of Capt Home, any Injuries Insults or causes of irritation had been offered to him: — To the other parts of your Letter, implicating the Government and people of Rhode Island, I — must oppose the same Statements of the Governor; But on the particular Fact you relate, that the Buoy was cut from an Anchor of the Africa, when she had, in stress of weather, slipped her Cable, I have no information to enable me to say any thing. I will only remark that the nature of the case does not admit of the peremptory conclusion drawn by you, "that the Buoy had been cut away by some people from the Shore": But admitting it as a fact, the Government cannot be responsible for the secret Acts of individuals of the kind here stated. By what means the Letter of Capt Home and the other papers (you mention) were made public, I am ignorant. But their publication is no proof of partial resentments — against British subjects. Where any Citizens of France have practised outrages or acts of injustice against the Citizens of the United States Letters and protests declaring the same have been published without reserve. But the publication of Capt Home's Letter far from being a reprehensible Act, may have been necessary on the part of the Governor, if he had thought himself amenable to such peculiarly insolent[undecipherable] demands, that the people of Rhode Island, under his — Government, being forewarned might be obedient, and so escape the Captain's threatened Vengeance: — The outrage on the packet where M^r Fauchet and his papers were [undecipherable] to be found, was too notorious to be concealed: Cap^t [undecipherable] his hands and passengers and among these, M^r Fauchet, Secretary, could not but develop the matters: and it must ever be doubted, whether the exhibition of a Definitive [undecipherable] Facts, attested under Oaths, was not more to be desired on the part of Capt Home, than the less formal Accounts of the affairs with their probable exaggerations, which otherwise have been made public. But Sir — I wish not to enter into any altercation on these Subjects — The Substantial Facts, which must call in Questions, and on which the Presidents decision has been given, will not be affected by such an inadvertence on either side — To me it will be much more agreeable to seize every occasion to promote a restoration of Harmony and Goodwill — I am Respectfully Sir Your ob Serv^t (Signed) Timothy Pickering M^r Bond Esq^r Charg^e des affaires } of his Britannick Majesty }