General
proposed immediately a conference with Mr Adams, to put a final hand
to it.

_August 19th._ The States of Holland separated on the 17th, after
having resolved and decreed instructions for the Plenipotentiaries,
which the Republic sends to treat with Mr Fitzherbert, in conjunction
with France and her allies. They talk, among other things, of acting
in all respects in a communicative manner, and in concert with the
Ministers of the King of France, and the other belligerent powers, in
the preparatory and preliminary negotiations, which they may begin
with the Ambassador of Great Britain, to do nothing without them, and
to be assured above all of the sincere and unequivocal intentions of
the British king, to leave for the future the Republic in the full
enjoyment of the rights of neutrality, established in the Russian
declaration of the 28th of February, 1780.

I have the honor to be, &c.

DUMAS.

* * * * *

ROBERT R. LIVINGSTON TO C. W. F. DUMAS.

Philadelphia, September 5th, 1782.

Sir,

It was not till within these few weeks, that I received your favor of
the 4th of April last, together with the interesting paper it
enclosed, since which time we are informed that your prediction
relative to the reception of Mr Adams has been verified. It would have
given me great pleasure to have learned so important an event, with
the steps that immediately led to it from your pen. Your usual
punctuality induces me to believe that your letters have been
unfortunate, since I cannot ascribe this omission to neglect. When you
do me the honor to write again, be pleased to enter minutely into the
subject; since everything that relates to it is not only important in
itself, but will be so much the object of curiosity hereafter, that it
should have a place among our archives.

It would be a great advantage to you and to us, if you maintained such
a correspondence with your sea-ports as would enable you to avail
yourselves of every opportunity of writing to us, as it would give
your letters the charms of novelty, and preserve to you the character
of attention, and to us, as it would enable us to confirm or
contradict the accounts, that we continually receive by private
letters, or through the enemy's papers, some time before we have your
relation of them.

The enemy have at len