[Docket: to [undecipherable] 16 Aug^t 1799 / an establish[ment] / [undecipherable] Creek [undecipherable] / recently] 16 Aug^t 1799 Dear Sir I write you to suspend writing to M'Harper relative to the project of his friends, to establish a trading house in the Creek nation, until I can reflect more at leisure upon it, and have further conversation with you. If traders of large capital are introduced into the Creek nation, who will administer to their wants, on as large a scale and as good terms as the U.S., there can be no doubt of their sap[strikethrough: [undecipherable] entirely their no [undecipherable] / [undecipherable] the [undecipherable] trade [undecipherable] / what [undecipherable] passions [undecipherable] affections / perhaps in their affections that it] it is the object of the trade to preserve. This cannot be accomplished by small traders, who are more dependent on the Indians than the Indians are on them. I do not know the character nor the extent of their views of the applicants, and entertain doubts were I even satisfied on those [undecipherable] points of the policy of a step which might produce a large change of system, transform [strikethrough: alienate] the affections of the Creeks [strikethrough: to] or at least render them less dependent upon the U.S. than and less manageable by our agents. than I incline therefore to believe that, at least for the present, it will be best to leave things as they are. If you [strikethrough: receive the] incline to this opinion [strikethrough: to that case] M'Harper might be informed, that the project at this juncture cannot be encouraged. [undecipherable] Yours truly.