there was
expectation that Mr. Madison would come to France. It has lain by me
ever since.

"The second part, that of settlement for the captures, I will make the
subject of a future correspondence. Salut et respect."

Talleyrand's Reply ("Foreign Relations, 15 Vendemaire An. 6," Oct.
6, 1797): "I have the honor to return you, Citizen, with very sincere
thanks, your Letter to General Washington which you have had the
goodness to show me.

"I have received the letter which you have taken the trouble to write
me, the 9th of this month. I need not assure you of the appreciation
with which I shall receive the further indications you promise on the
means of terminating in a durable manner the differences which must
excite your interest as a patriot and as a Republican. Animated by
such a principle your ideas cannot fail to throw valuable light on the
discussion you open, and which should have for its object to reunite the
two Republics in whose alienation the enemies of liberty triumph."

Paine's plan made a good impression in France--He writes to Jefferson,
October 6, 1800, that the Consul Le Brun, at an entertainment given to
the American envoys, gave for his toast: "A l'union de 1' Amerique avec
les Puissances du Nord pour faire respecter la liberte des mers."

The malignant mind, like the jaundiced eye, sees everything through a
false medium of its own creating. The light of heaven appears stained
with yellow to the distempered sight of the one, and the fairest actions
have the form of crimes in the venomed imagination of the other.

For seven months, both before and after my return to America in October
last, the apostate papers styling themselves "Federal" were filled with
paragraphs and Essays respecting a letter from Mr. Jefferson to me at
Paris; and though none of them knew the contents of the letter, nor the
occasion of writing it, malignity taught them to suppose it, and the
lying tongue of injustice lent them its aid.

That the public may no longer be imposed upon by Federal apostacy, I
will now publish the Letter, and the occasion of its being written.

The Treaty negociated in England by John Jay, and ratified by the
Washington Administration, had so disgracefully surrendered the right
and freedom of the American flag, that all the Commerce of the
United States on the Ocean became exposed to capture, and suffered in
consequence of it. The duration of the Treaty was limited to two years
after the war