w, of taking it. However, this would be a question between the State
of Georgia and the widow of General Oglethorpe, in the decision of which
the Chevalier de Mezieres is not interested, because, whether she takes
the land by the will, for her own use, or for that of the State, it is
equally prevented from descending to him: there is neither a conveyance
to him, nor a succession _ab intestato_ devolving on him, which are the
cases provided for by our treaty with France. To sum up the matter in
a few words; if the lands had passed to the State before the epoch of
peace, the heirs of General Oglethorpe cannot say they have descended
on them, and if they remained in the General at that epoch, the treaty
saving them to him, he could convey them away from his heirs, and he has
conveyed them to his widow, either for her own use, or for that of the
State.

Seeing no event, in which, according to the facts stated to me, the
treaty could be applied to this case, or could give any right, whatever,
to the heirs of General Oglethorpe, I advised the Chevalier de Mezieres
not to urge his pretensions on the footing of right, nor under the
treaty, but to petition the Assembly of Georgia for a grant of these
lands. If, in the question between the State and the widow of General
Oglethorpe, it should be decided that they were the property of the
State, I expected from their generosity, and the friendly dispositions
in America towards the subjects of France, that they would be favorable
to the Chevalier de Mezieres. There is nothing in the preceding
observations, which would not have applied against the heir of General
Ogiethorpe, had he been a native citizen of Georgia, as it now applies
against him, being a subject of France. The treaty has placed the
subjects of France on a footing with natives, as to conveyances and
descent of property. There was no occasion for the assemblies to pass
laws on this subject; the treaty being a law, as I conceive, superior to
those of particular Assemblies, and repealing them where they stand in
the way of its operations.

The supposition that the treaty was disregarded on our part, in the
instance of the acts of Assembly of Massachusetts and New Hampshire,
which made a distinction between natives and foreigners, as to the
duties to be paid on commerce, was taken notice of in the letter of
November the 20th, which I had the honor of addressing to the Count de
Vergennes. And while I express my hopes, that