[M^r M^cHenry &c &c &c] The Hague 2^d Dec^r 1799— My dear Sir I have received your favour of 22^d Oct^r. John who is an excellent young man has come. We live happily. With yours I received some others !!! I have reason to believe that my letter to Talleyrand, of 5 att. they cant make a noise against me. [undecipherable] like in the name of Diplomatick y fall you [undecipherable] were then given, as well as the assurances to the public, if at all given! [undecipherable] were they not more maturely considered in [undecipherable: probable reading: their] [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] [undecipherable] aking they were not at in the [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] [undecipherable: probable reading: Secret] [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] as of you government, but I was in rela in [undecipherable] I add, an individual, a traveller, that [undecipherable] to [undecipherable] M^r [undecipherable] M^r [undecipherable] I speak as a Diplomatist & say I was unknown, as a man having nothing to communicate, the intentions of my govt. to a foreign Gov. for the purpose of their doing a fresh Governmental act in consequence of such a communication "at most it is impossible to make my letter more than Semiofficial" As to the air of pleasure with which it was written I was to presume that friends would be agreeable. Never to a Government, no matter good or bad, rated or not. the career once opened, the accidents followed from the principles adopted. The air of inducement [undecipherable] I have [undecipherable] to a thing to be received from a man whom they did not [underline: officially] know, whose authority, nor they nor any but myself had seen. That air upon an occasion presumed to be agreeable. - was given in the true spirit of an inofficial letter of that sort as not equivalent to that of an official one! If this affair have made a noise, as I [undecipherable] this think it has, I beg you as a candid man - even if you too have thought these [undecipherable] matters unnecessary, to show this letter is rather to mention my grounds at least to the President & to our Washington. As to Picton you will hear more of them. I have written to Harber yesterday. [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] of which my letter, more words [undecipherable] [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] by the [undecipherable] high spirit of the President [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] [strikethrough: [undecipherable]] disgraced by the olive [undecipherable] on [undecipherable] county [undecipherable]! [undecipherable] [undecipherable]! Yet what will come I am ready. I have been greatly worried, low & injured in health & exhausted in Spirits. I have acted with zeal & honour. I have not been inactive. I was ordered to be active. So I have as little to approach me with, as most men who act in such times & with very little guiding. It is impossible to say what Bonaparte means, --- [Hon^ble James M^cHenry, Esq. Secretary of War &c &c — Philadelphia.] [seal] [received [undecipherable] inst recd [undecipherable] 179[undecipherable]] [Secretary of War Indian affairs]