style could not fail to make a deep impression on
a mind penetrated with a just sense of those obligations by which the
chief magistrate is bound to guard the dignity of his government, and
to take care that his nation be not degraded in his person. Yet, in no
single instance, did the administration, in its communications with
Mr. Genet, permit itself to be betrayed into the use of one
intemperate expression. The firmness with which the extravagant
pretensions of that gentleman were resisted, proceeding entirely from
a sense of duty and conviction of right, was unaccompanied with any
marks of that resentment which his language and his conduct were alike
calculated to inspire.

[Sidenote: State of parties.]

Mr. Genet appears to have been prevented from acquiescing in a line of
conduct thus deliberately adopted and prudently pursued, by a belief
that the sentiments of the people were in direct opposition to the
measures of their government. So excessive, and so general, were the
demonstrations of enthusiastic devotion to France; so open were their
expressions of outrage and hostility towards all the powers at war
with that republic; so thin was the veil which covered the chief
magistrate from that stream of malignant opprobrium directed against
every measure which thwarted the views of Mr. Genet; that a person
less sanguine than that minister might have cherished the hope of
being able ultimately to triumph over the opposition to his designs.
Civic festivals, and other public assemblages of people, at which the
ensigns of France were displayed in union with those of America; at
which the red cap, as a symbol of French liberty and fraternity,
triumphantly passed from head to head; at which toasts were given
expressive of a desire to identify the people of America with those of
France; and, under the imposing guise of adhering to principles not to
men, containing allusions to the influence of the President which
could not be mistaken; appeared to Mr. Genet to indicate a temper
extremely favourable to his hopes, and very different from that which
would be required for the preservation of an honest neutrality.
Through the medium of the press, these sentiments were communicated to
the public, and were represented as flowing from the hearts of the
great body of the people. In various other modes, that important
engine contributed its powerful aid to the extension of opinions,
calculated, essentially, to vary the situation o