1 We are not insensible of the fact that many suppose that the authorship of this notable letter belongs to John Jay ; but, because the entire spirit of it is so unlike what he would have presented in huch a letter, written under such circumstances ; and because he is known to have been more inclined to resort to a Non-Importation Agreement than James Duane was, we prefer to favor the belief that the latter gentleman wrote it.

2 Because it was so entirely antagonistic to the known principles of the Boston-men with whom the minority of the Committee, in their individual relations, had been previously so entirely in accord, this answer to the letters from Boston, approved by the unanimous vote of the Committee, affords additional evidence of the entire good faith of the great body of the unfranchised inhabitants of the City, in its concurrence in the appointment of the Committee of Fifty-one, and of the acquiescence in that appointment of, at least, those of the previously assumed leaders of those inhabitants who had been admitted to seats in that Committee.

3 Minutes of the Committee, (adjourned Meeting) "New York, May 23, "1774 ;" Holt's New-York Journal, No. 1638, New-York, Thursday, May 26, 1774; Gaine 's New- York Gazette and Mercury, No. 1178, New-York, Monday, May 23 ; No. 1179, New- York, Monday, May 30, and No. 1183, New-York, Monday, June 27, 1774 ; Rivington's New-York Gazetteer, No. 57, New- York Thursday, May 19, and No. 58, New-York, Thursday, May 26, 1774.