embers of the Committee of Public Safety still remained in considerable
force, and had they found out that Mr. Monroe had no official authority
upon the case, they would have paid little or no regard to his
reclamation of me. In the mean time my health was suffering exceedingly,
the dreary prospect of winter was coming on, and imprisonment was still
a thing of danger. After the Robespierrian members of the Committee were
removed by the expiration of their time of serving, Mr. Monroe reclaimed
me, and I was liberated the 4th of November. Mr. Monroe arrived in Paris
the beginning of August before. All that period of my imprisonment,
at least, I owe not to Robespierre, but to his colleague in projects,
George Washington. Immediately upon my liberation, Mr. Monroe invited me
to his house, where I remained more than a year and a half; and I speak
of his aid and friendship, as an open-hearted man will always do in such
a case, with respect and gratitude.

Soon after my liberation, the Convention passed an unanimous vote,
to invite me to return to my seat among them. The times were still
unsettled and dangerous, as well from without as within, for the
coalition was unbroken, and the constitution not settled. I chose,
however, to accept the invitation: for as I undertake nothing but what
I believe to be right, I abandon nothing that I undertake; and I
was willing also to shew, that, as I was not of a cast of mind to be
deterred by prospects or retrospects of danger, so neither were my
principles to be weakened by misfortune or perverted by disgust.

Being now once more abroad in the world, I began to find that I was
not the only one who had conceived an unfavourable opinion of Mr.
Washington; it was evident that his character was on the decline as well
among Americans as among foreigners of different nations. From being the
chief of the government, he had made himself the chief of a party;
and his integrity was questioned, for his politics had a doubtful
appearance. The mission of Mr. Jay to London, notwithstanding there
was an American Minister there already, had then taken place, and was
beginning to be talked of. It appeared to others, as it did to me, to
be enveloped in mystery, which every day served either to increase or to
explain into matter of suspicion.

In the year 1790, or about that time, Mr. Washington, as President,
had sent Gouverneur Morris to London, as his secret agent to have some
communication with the Br