One of 50 numbered copies inscribed (by the author) for The International Benjamin Franklin Society. "Recently a happy chance has resurrected some letters of James Read, the Pennsylvania lawyer ... These missives, neglected for nearly two centuries ... chiefly concern a debt owing by Read to Franklin's friend and correspondent William Strahan, the Scottish printer and bookseller, long resident in London. They reveal Poor Richard in the grotesque role of the collector of a doubtful account ... The debt was contracted whilst all the parties were loyal members of the British Crown; its enforcement overlapped the American Revolution ... ."