'As for my medalls in your hands I confide intirely in your hononour [sic] & judgment to [di]spose of Them as you shall think fit. I believe I might have sold Them much better Twenty Years agoe [th]an I can now, but that signifyes nothing. That was Then and Now is Now. I was Then Twenty Thousand Pounds better in Estate than I am now. for the Stone of the Ring alone I was offered One hundred Venetian zecchini for it at Smyrna, by a Jesuit who had a Commission to buy up such Curiositys for the Court of France. & to the best of my remembrance Mr Davenant Her Majesty Queen Anne’s Envoy at Frankfort came to my House at Hackny & offered me £60 or 60 Guynies for it: but I had then hopes of getting more for it. but noe regard is to be had for what is past, but to the present time. soe as I sayed before, whatever you dispose of the Medalls & Ring for I shall be intirely satisfyed with & the sooner They are disposed \of/ it will be the more acceptable to me, by reason I have a very pressing Occasion at this time for Mony. [sends him a bottle of Cyprus wine as a token of gratitude].'
(London, British Library, Sloane MS 4051, f.21; Burnett 2020b, pp. 568, 623)