my [undecipherable: late] letter to Col. Pickering, inform'd him of my [undecipherable: disposition] respecting Major Tousard, & personal reasons in requesting a furlough to go to Hispaniola. I thought it my Duty to do it as a Citizen of the [undecipherable: States] as an officer in this Service. yet it is upon the whole bad [undecipherable: acquisition], a Major Tousard may have some good necessity to give to the officers a command to remove from their minds the cause of that uneasiness. I therefore wish that you should thereby [undecipherable: endeavor] to withdraw your [undecipherable: kind] instruction from Major Tousard, and to deprive him of that furlough and [undecipherable: you] gave him hope to obtain, and which he perhaps will not make a bad [undecipherable: use]. I have the honor to be with Respect Sir, your obed^t Serv^t Step. Rochefontaine Lt. Col. comd^t of y^e corps of art^s. & Eng^s. [address panel:] Step. Rochefontaine March 27 — 1796 (fav^d) the Honorable James M^cHenry — Esq^r Secretary of war Philadelphia