I had occasion lately to write to Croker concerning the conduct of our ships at the siege of Rosas in 1808

(Cap^t Bennet in the Fame)

which the French represent as very bad, – & the Spaniards rather attempt to excuse than vindicate. He sent me all the documents he could collect, & in the note which accompanied them he says “Did you not tell me once that you wished to have back your butt of sack instead of some allowance for it?

If you have any wish on the subject, let me have a brief, & I will plead the cause.”

Now in order to furnish him with this brief, I want to know, what the allowance is (which I do not know) – & what the in what manner my predecessors were supplied with the wine when they took it in kind. Dear Grosvenor, for as much as you love sack, do enquire into this matter for me, & enable me to state my case. – What I want is an order upon the Kings wine merchant

for my butt, – & an arrangement with him for taking out the value part in the authentic sack, the rest in other wines, to wit Claret & Rhenish,

– for I would drink nothing worse.

My full dressed book

<alone would> deserve the restitution of my rights – which ought also to be made in respect to the memory of Ben Johnson.

I have added largely to the rhymes upon Lodore, so that the thing is really become a curiosity of its kind, & I am about to send it to Joanna Baillie for her charitable volume.

I should like you to see a Baltimore review of the Life of Wesley,

xxx writes <wherein it is> asserted as a matter beyond all doubt that I planned it upon the model of the Iliad. It is full of the highest praise of the execution, & the grossest misstatement of its principles & object.

Ask Henry for me if the Cap^t Bennet who commanded the Fame in 1808 was Grey Bennet.