r. Jefferson on such a constitution.

Genet had now become cool, assured Mr. Jefferson that the privateer was
not yet ready for sea, and, without promising that she should not sail
before the president's return, said that it would be necessary for her
to shift her position to the lower end of the town to receive supplies,
and gave the secretary to understand that she would not leave before
Washington's return to Philadelphia. Jefferson accepted his remarks as
honest assurance, and Governor Mifflin dismissed his soldiers; but
Hamilton and Knox, having no faith in the minister's word, proposed the
immediate erection of a battery below the city, where Fort Mifflin stood
in the Revolution, with guns mounted to prevent the privateer's going
down the river. Jefferson, fearing further to offend Genet, refused to
concur in this measure, and the next day the vessel went down the river
as far as Chester.

Washington returned to Philadelphia on the eleventh, and received some
papers, concerning the events we have just described, from Mr.
Jefferson, with an intimation that they required "instant attention."
They aroused the president's indignation. "What is to be done in the
case of the _Little Sarah_ [the original name of the _Petite Democrat_]
now at Chester?" he asked, in a note written to Mr. Jefferson on the
spur of the moment. "Is the minister of the French republic to set the
acts of this government at defiance _with impunity_, and then threaten
the executive with an appeal to the people? What must the world think of
such conduct, and of the government of the United States in submitting
to it?

"These are serious questions. Circumstances press for a decision, and,
as you have had time to consider them (upon me they come unexpectedly),
I wish to know your opinion upon them, even before to-morrow, for the
vessel may then be gone."

Mr. Jefferson assured Washington that the privateer was not yet ready
for sea, and that Genet had promised that she should not sail before the
decision of the president in her case should be known. In a cabinet
council held the next day, it was resolved to detain in the ports of the
United States all privateers which had been equipped therein, and this
decision was immediately communicated to Genet. In defiance of it, the
French minister sent the privateer to sea; and yet the republicans,
forgetful of all national dignity, commended the representative of a
foreign nation in thus offering a marke