 London.
    After some dispute, they agreed to his proposal, and contracted with him for
fifteen thousand hogsheads a year, for which they obliged themselves to pay
ready money, on its arrival in any one or more convenient ports in the south or
western coasts of Great Britain, that he should please to fix upon for that
purpose. M-- no sooner obtained this contract, than he immediately set out for
America, in order to put it in execution; and, by way of companion, carried with
him a little French abbé, a man of humour, wit and learning, with whom he had
been long acquainted, and for whom he had done many good offices.
    On his arrival in Virginia, which opportunely happened at a time when all
the gentlemen were assembled in the capital of that province, he published a
memorial, representing the disadvantages under which their trade was carried on,
the true method of redressing their own grievances in that respect, and
proposing to contract with them for the yearly quantity of fifteen thousand
hogs-heads of such tobacco as was fit for the French market, at a price which he
demonstrated to be considerably greater than that which they had formerly
received.
    This remonstrance met with all the success and encouragement he could
expect: the principal planters seeing their own interest concerned, readily
assented to the proposal, which, by their influence, was also relished by the
rest; and the only difficulty that remained, related to the security for payment
of the bills on the arrival of the tobacco in England, and to the time
stipulated for the continuance of the contract.
    In order to remove these objections, Mr. M- returned to Europe, and found
the French company of farmers disposed to agree to every thing he desired for
facilitating the execution of the contract, and perfectly well pleased with the
sample which he had already sent: but his good friend the abbé, (whom he had
left behind him in America) by an unparalleled piece of treachery, found means
to overturn the whole project. He secretly wrote a memorial to the company,
importing, that he found by experience, M-- could afford to furnish them at a
much lower price than that which they had agreed to give; and that, by being in
possession of the contract for five years, as was intended according to the
proposal, he would have the company so much in his power, that they must
afterwards submit to any price he should please to impose; and that if they
thought him worthy of such a trust, he would undertake to furnish them at an
easier rate, in
