This letterbook features outgoing correspondence written from Canton (China), concerning commerce and shipping. Also included is a letter to John Sergeant (1838) concerning the book.

These selections include letters, bills, accounts, receipts, memoranda, and official communications and documents relating to the Iroquois in New York state, selected from volumes 6-15 of O'Reilly's collections, "Mementos of western settlement," together with copies of documents from the American State Papers, etc. Included are letters of Phelps, Gorham, Chapin, Brant, Kirkland, Knox, Pickering, Irvine, and Morris. Many manuscripts appear to be from the papers of General Israel Chapin, an Indian agent.