But
a campaign or two more will relieve them from further trouble or expense
in defending their American possessions.
You once gave me a copy of the journal of your campaign in Virginia, in
1781, which I must have lent to some one of the undertakers to write
the history of the revolutionary war, and forgot to reclaim. I conclude
this, because it is no longer among my papers, which I have very
diligently searched for it, but in vain. An author of real ability
is now writing that part of the history of Virginia. He does it in my
neighborhood, and I lay open to him all my papers. But I possess none,
nor has he any, which can enable him to do justice to your faithful and
able services in that campaign. If you could be so good as to send me
another copy, by the very first vessel bound to any port of the United
States, it might be here in time; for although he expects to begin
to print within a month or two, yet you know the delays of these
undertakings. At any rate, it might be got in as a supplement. The old
Count Rochambeau gave me also his memoire of the operations at York,
which is gone the same way, and I have no means of applying to his
family for it. Perhaps you could render them as well as us, the service
of procuring another copy.
I learn, with real sorrow, the deaths of Monsieur and Madame de Tesse.
They made an interesting part in the idle reveries in which I have
sometimes indulged myself, of seeing all my friends of Paris once
more, for a month or two; a thing impossible, which, however, I never
permitted myself to despair of.
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