n of them
will rest in my own bosom, unless some further agitation of the matter
shall make a disclosure necessary. I am much at a loss to conceive what
part of my conduct could have given encouragement to an address which to
me seems big with the greatest mischiefs that can befall my country. If
I am not deceived in the knowledge of myself, you could not have found a
person to whom your schemes are more disagreeable. At the same time, in
justice to my own feelings, I must add, that no man possesses a more
serious wish to see ample justice done to the army than I do; and, as
far as my power and influence, in a constitutional way, extend, they
shall be employed to the utmost of my abilities to effect it, should
there be any occasion. Let me conjure you, then, if you have any regard
for your country, concern for yourself or posterity, or respect for me,
to banish these thoughts from your mind, and never communicate, as from
yourself or any one else, a sentiment of the like nature. I am, etc."

This stern rebuke at once silenced the faction, and checked all further
movement in the direction of king-making. How brightly did the
patriotism of Washington shine out in this affair! At the head of a
victorious army; beloved and venerated by it and by the people; with
personal influence unbounded, and with power in possession for
consummating almost any political scheme not apparently derogatory to
good government, he receives from an officer whom he greatly esteems,
and who speaks for himself and others, an offer of the sceptre of
supreme rule and the crown of royalty! What a bribe! Yet he does not
hesitate for a moment; he does not stop to revolve in his mind any ideas
of advantage in the proposed scheme, but at once rebukes the author
sternly but kindly, and impresses his signet of strongest disapprobation
upon the proposal. History can not present a parallel.

The summer of 1782 passed away without much apparent progress being made
toward a definite and permanent arrangement for peace. At the beginning
of August, Carleton and Digby wrote a joint letter to Washington,
informing him that they had good authority for saying, that negotiations
for peace had been commenced at Paris, by commissioners, and that the
British representatives in that conference, would first propose the
independence of the United States as a basis. But Washington, taught by
past experience, was still doubtful of the reality of all these
professions. "Jea