terpreter
between Paine and Barere. There was never any charge at all
made against Paine, as the Archives of France now prove,
save that he was a "foreigner." Paine was of coarse ignorant
of the conspiracy between Morris and Deforgues which had
imprisoned him. Bourdon de l'Oise, one of the most cruel
Jacobins and Terrorists, afterwards conspired with Pichegru
to overthrow the Republic, and was with him banished (1797)
to Sinamari, South America, where he died soon after his
arrival.--_Editor._.

Did they mean to kidnap General Washington, Mr. Madison, and several
other Americans whom they dubbed with the same title as well as me? Let
any man look at the condition of France when I arrived in it,--invaded
by Austrians and Prussians and declared to be in danger,--and then ask
if any man who had a home and a country to go to, as I had in America,
would have come amongst them from any other motive than of assisting
them. If I could possibly have supposed them capable of treachery
I certainly would not have trusted myself in their power. Instead
therefore of your being unwilling or apprehensive of meeting the
question of French citizenship, they ought to be ashamed of advancing
it, and this will be the case unless you admit their arguments or
objections too passively. It is a case on their part fit only for
the continuations of Robespierre to set up. As to the name of French
citizen, I never considered it in any other light, so far as regarded
myself, than as a token of honorary respect. I never made them any
promise nor took any oath of allegiance or of citizenship, nor bound
myself by an act or means whatever to the performance of any thing.
I acted altogether as a friend invited among them as I supposed on
honorable terms. I did not come to join myself to a Government already
formed, but to assist in forming one _de nouveau_, which was afterwards
to be submitted to the people whether they would accept it or not, and
this any foreigner might do. And strictly speaking there are no citizens
before this is a government. They are all of the People. The Americans
were not called citizens till after Government was established, and not
even then until they had taken the oath of allegiance. This was the
case in Pennsylvania. But be this French citizenship more or less, the
Convention have swept it away by declaring me to be a foreigner, and
imprisoning me as such; and this is a short an