Sir,
Your letter of March 4th was read in Congress three days ago, being then only first received by the Committee of Foreign Affairs. We should have been very happy to have received it before the 8th of June,[69] as it would, undoubtedly, have founded a resolve of Congress more agreeable to us to communicate officially, than that to which we must now refer you in their journals, printed authoritatively by David C. Claypole, and which are in the hands of Doctor Franklin, or Doctor Arthur Lee, at Paris.
We have till now omitted to forward to you that resolve for your recall from the Court of Tuscany, as we daily expected a settlement of a definite recompense for your services to these United States. But the modes of doing business in such an assembly as Congress will not warrant our detaining, until such settlement, some important papers committed to us to be sent to the Court of France.
I am, with sincere regard, &c.
JAMES LOVELL,
For the Committee of Foreign Affairs.
TO THE COMMITTEE OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS.
Paris, September 29th, 1779.
Gentlemen,
I have lately been favored with your letter of the 17th of July, referring me to a resolution of Congress of the 8th of June, by which I find that they have been pleased to recall me. It has long been my wish to resign a commission, which did not put it in my power to be of any service to America; and, therefore, if Congress had had the goodness to have expressed their resolution in such a manner as not to have conveyed a censure, which my conscience tells me I have not deserved, it would have given me a great deal of pleasure.