Gentlemen

The delay of an answer to yours of the 18th Ulto to has been occasioned by our waiting for a plan & Estimate of the repairs necessary for your Fort Lyttleton which we requested Capt. [John] Joiner to procure, but we have not yet received it, when we receive them we shall give that subject the consideration which is due to it. ー

The present circumstances of this Colony renders it absolutely indispensable that we should detain the two Thousand Weight of Gun Powder which we had lodged under your protection for the order of the Council of Safety in Georgia & we desire you will not part with it until you hear further from us ー we shall write to that Board at Savanna by the next mail & we flatter ourselves with hopes that no order will appear on you for said powder before we have obtained their concurrence be that as it may we request you not to part with it before we have interchanged another Letter on the subject ー

As to the 400 l[b] Powder which you detained pr your Chairman's Rect we can only say that it added to 600 l[b] formerly detained by Collo [Stephen] Bull, the amount by far exceeds a due proportion of the whole Colony Magazine compared with other parts of the Colony, but we make no doubt of your economy & strict watchfulness to prevent misapplication of any part of an article upon which our safety from attacks even by our domestic foes may so immediately depend,&c.