I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most perfect esteem and respect, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,

Th:  Jefferson.

LETTER CXXI.—­TO MONSIEUR LAMBERT, January 3, 1788

TO MONSIEUR LAMBERT.

Paris, January 3, 1788.

Sir,

I am honored with your Excellency’s letter of the 29th of December, enclosing the Arret on the commerce between France and the United States.  I availed myself of the occasion of a vessel sailing this day from Havre for New York, to forward it to Congress.  They will receive with singular satisfaction, this new testimony of his Majesty’s friendship for the United States, of his dispositions to promote their interest, and to strengthen the bands which connect the two nations.

Permit me, Sir, to return you, personally, my sincere thanks for the great attention you have paid to this subject, for the sacrifices you have kindly made of a time so precious as yours, every moment of which is demanded and is occupied by objects interesting to the happiness of millions; and to proffer you the homage of those sincere sentiments of attachment and respect, with which I have the honor to be, your Excellency’s most obedient and most humble servant,

Th:  Jefferson.

LETTER CXXII.—­TO LE COMTE BERNSTORFF, January 21, 1788

TO LE COMTE BERNSTORFF, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Copenhagen.

Paris, January 21, 1788.

Sir,

I am instructed by the United States of America, in Congress assembled, to bring again under the consideration of his Majesty, the King of Denmark, and of his ministers, the case of the three prizes taken from the English during the late war, by an American squadron under the command of Commodore Paul Jones, put into Bergen in distress, there rescued from our possession by orders from the court of Denmark, and delivered back to the English.  Dr. Franklin, then Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States at the court of Versailles, had the honor of making applications to the court of Denmark, for a just indemnification to the persons interested, and particularly by a letter of the 22nd of December, 1779, a copy of which I have now the honor of enclosing to your Excellency.  In consequence of this, the sum of ten thousand pounds was proposed to him, as an indemnification, through the Baron de Waltersdorff, then at Paris.  The departure of both those gentlemen from this place, soon after, occasioned an intermission in the correspondence on this subject.  But the United States continue to be very sensibly affected by this delivery of their prizes to Great Britain, and the more so, as no part of their conduct had forfeited their claim to those rights of hospitality, which civilized nations extend to each other.  Not only a sense of justice due