and felt the same solicitude. The extreme jealousy, however, with which the persons who administered the government of France, as well as a large party in America, watched his deportment towards all those whom the ferocious despotism of the jacobins had exiled from their country, imposed upon him the painful necessity of observing great circumspection in his official conduct, on this delicate subject. A formal interposition in favour of the virtuous and unfortunate victim of their furious passions, would have been unavailing. Without benefiting the person whom it would be designed to aid, it might produce serious political mischief. But the American ministers employed at foreign courts were instructed to seize every fair occasion to express, unofficially, the interest taken by the President in the fate of Lafayette; and to employ the most eligible means in their power to obtain his liberty, or to meliorate his situation. A confidential person* had been sent to Berlin to solicit his discharge but before this messenger had reached his destination, the King of Prussia had delivered over his illustrious prisoner to the Emperor of Germany. Mr. Pinckney had been instructed not only to indicate the wishes of the President to the Austrian minister at London, but to endeavour, unofficially, to obtain the powerful mediation of Britain; and had at one time flattered himself that the cabinet of St. James would take an interest in the case; but this hope was soon dissipated.

After being disappointed in obtaining the mediation of the British cabinet, the President addressed the following letter to the Emperor of Ger

many.

"It will readily occur to your majesty that occasions may sometimes exist, on which official considerations would constrain the chief of a nation to be silent and passive in relation even to objects which affect his sensibility and claim his interposition as a man. Finding myself precisely in this situation at present, I take the liberty of writing this private letter to your majesty, being persuaded that my motives will also be my apology for it.

"In common with the people of this country, I retain a strong and cordial sense of the services rendered to them by the Marquis de Lafayette; and my friendship for him has been constant and sincere. It is natural, therefore, that I should sympathize with him and his family in their misfortunes, and endeavour to mitigate the calamities they experience, among which his present confinement is not the least distressing. "I forbear to enlarge on this delicate subject. Permit me only to submit to your majesty's consideration, whether his long imprisonment, and the confiscation of his estate, and the indigence and dispersion of

* Mr. James Marshall.

his family, and the painful anxieties incident to all these circumstances, do not form an assemblage of sufferings which recommend him to the mediation of humanity? allow me, sir, on this occasion, to be its organ; and to entreat that he may be permitted to come to this country, on such conditions, and under such restrictions, as your majesty may think it expedient to prescribe.

"As it is a maxim with me not to ask what, under similar circumstances, I would not grant, your majesty will do me the justice to believe that this request appears to me to correspond with those great principles of magnanimity and wisdom, which form the basis of sound policy, and durable glory."

This letter was transmitted to Mr. Pinckney to be conveyed to the Emperor through his minister at London. How far it operated in mitigating immediately the rigour of Lafayette's confinement, or in obtaining his liberation, remains unascertained.

CHAPTER XI.

Letter from General Washington to Mr. Jefferson.-Hostile measures of France against the United States.-Mr. Monroe recalled and General Pinckney appointed to succeed him.-General Washington's valedictory address to the people of the United States.-The Minister of France endeavours to influence the approaching election.-The President's speech to Congress.-He denies the authenticity of certain spurious letters published in 1776.-John Adams elected President, and Thomas Jefferson Vice President.-General Washington retires to Mount Vernon.Political situation of the United States at this period.-The French government refuses to receive General Pinckney as Minister.-Congress is convened.-President's speech.-Three envoys extraordinary deputed to France.-Their treatment. -Measures of hostility adopted by the American government against France.General Washington appointed commander in chief of the American army.-His death. And character.

1796.

THE Confidential friends of the President had long known his fixed purpose to retire from office at the end of his second term, and the people generally suspected it. Those who dreaded a change of system, in changing the person, of the chief magistrate, manifested an earnest desire to avoid this hazard, by being permitted once more to offer to the public choice a person who, amidst all the fierce conflicts of party, still remained the object of public veneration. But his resolution was to be shaken only by the obvious approach of a perilous crisis, which, endangering the safety of the nation, would make it unworthy of his character, and incompatible with his principles, to retreat from its service. In the apprehension that the co-operation of external with internal causes might bring about such a crisis, he had yielded to the representations of those who urged him to leave himself master of his conduct, by withholding a public declaration of his intention, until the propriety of affording a reasonable time to fix on a successor should require its disclosure. "If," said Colonel Hamilton in a letter on this subject of the fifth of July, "a storm gathers, how can you retreat? this is a most serious question."

The suspense produced in the public opinion by this silence on the part of the chief magistrate, seemed to redouble the efforts of those who laboured to rob him of the affection of the people, and to attach odium to the political system which he had pursued. As passion alone is able successfully to contend with passion, they still sought, in the hate which America bore to Britain, and in her love to France, for the most powerful means with which to eradicate her love to Washington. Amongst

the various artifices employed to effect this object, was the publication of those queries which had been propounded by the President to his cabinet council, previous to the arrival of Mr. Genet. This publication was intended to demonstrate the existence of a disposition in the chief magistrate unfriendly to the French republic, of " a Machiavelian policy, which nothing but the universal sentiment of enthusiastic affection displayed by the people of the United States, on the arrival of Mr. Genet, could have subdued." Some idea of the intemperance of the day may be formed from the conclusion of that number of a series of virulent essays, in which these queries were inserted, and from recollecting that it was addressed to a man who, more than any other, had given character as well as independence to his country; and whose life, devoted to her service, had exhibited one pure undeviating course of virtuous exertion to promote her interests.

It is in these words: "The foregoing queries were transmitted for consideration to the heads of departments, previously to a meeting to be held at the President's house. The text needs no commentary. It has stamped upon its front in characters brazen enough for idolatry to comTo doubt in such a case was dishoprehend, perfidy and ingratitude. nourable, to proclaim those doubts treachery. For the honour of the American character and of human nature, it is to be lamented that the records of the United States exhibit such a stupendous monument of degeneracy. It will almost require the authenticity of holy writ to persuade posterity that it is not a libel ingeniously contrived to injure the reputation of the saviour of his country."

As this state paper was perfectly confidential, and had been communicated only to the cabinet ministers, Mr. Jefferson thought proper to free himself from any possible suspicion of having given it publicity, by assuring the President that this breach of confidence must be ascribed to some other person.

In answer to this letter the President said

"If I had entertained any suspicion before, that the queries which have been published in Bache's paper proceeded from you, the assurances you have given of the contrary would have removed them:-but the truth is, I harboured none. I am at no loss to conjecture from what source they flowed, through what channel they were conveyed, nor for what purpose they and similar publications appear.

"As you have mentioned the subject yourself, it would not be frank, candid, or friendly to conceal, that your conduct has been represented

* In the same letter Mr. Jefferson had stated his total abstraction from party questions.

as derogating from that opinion I conceived you entertained of me; that to your particular friends and connexions you have described, and they have denounced me, as a person under a dangerous influence, and that, if I would listen more to some other opinions, all would be well. My answer invariably has been, that I had never discovered any thing in the conduct of Mr. Jefferson to raise suspicions in my mind of his sincerity; that if he would retrace my public conduct while he was in the administration, abundant proofs would occur to him, that truth and right decisions were the sole objects of my pursuit; that there were as many instances within his own knowledge of my having decided against as in favour of the person evidently alluded to; and moreover, that I was no believer in the infallibility of the politics or measures of any man living. In short, that I was no party man myself, and that the first wish of my heart was, if parties did exist, to reconcile them.

“To this I may add, and very truly, that until the last year or two, I had no conception that parties would, or even could go the lengths I have been witness to; nor did I believe, until lately, that it was within the bounds of probability-hardly within those of possibility—that while I was using my utmost exertions to establish a national character of our own, independent as far as our obligations and justice would permit, of every nation of the earth; and wished by steering a steady course to preserve this country from the horrors of a desolating war, I should be accused of being the enemy of one nation and subject to the influence of another; and to prove it, that every act of my administration would be tortured, and the grossest and most insidious misrepresentations of them be made, by giving one side only of a subject, and that too in such exaggerated and indecent terms as could scarcely be applied to a Neroto a notorious defaulter-or even to a common pick-pocket.

"But enough of this-I have already gone further in the expression of my feelings than I intended."

Of the numerous misrepresentations and fabrications which, with unwearied industry, were pressed upon the public in order to withdraw the confidence of the nation from its chief, no one marked more strongly the depravity of that principle which justifies the means by the end, than the republication of certain forged letters, purporting to have been written by General Washington in the year 1776.

These letters had been originally published in the year 1777, and in them were interspersed, with domestic occurrences which might give them the semblance of verity, certain political sentiments favourable to Britain in the then existing contest.

But the original fabricator of these papers missed his aim. It was