this long tempest, amidst proscriptions and scaffolds,
this dreadful convention has opened the road to glory; after having
desolated the world, it has exhausted against itself its devouring
energy. Two parties, by turns victorious and vanquished, have been sent
to the scaffold by a third, which, embracing always the cause of the
strongest, preserved itself by sometimes striking against the mountain,
sometimes against the plain.

"Voracious men! your pernicious versatility has produced all the evils
which have devastated France; your wickedness, which you call wisdom,
has overflowed my native land with blood; and posterity will ask, with
wonder, 'What was the political opinion of those who condemned Danton,
Brissot, Lacroix, and Ducos; who advised with Robespierre and Lanjunais,
Billaud de Varennes, and Barrere?' Voracious men! you will be despised
by the present generation, and detested by posterity. Convention! the
murders and atrocities which thy reign has produced will be handed down
to posterity, and will not be credited."

Such was a life-picture, drawn by a master-hand, of the men and the
government with whose operations the leaders of a strong party in the
United States endeavored with mad zeal, for three years, to involve
their own government; a catastrophe prevented only, so far as human
agency was concerned, by the fearless courage and profound wisdom of
Washington in maintaining neutrality.

CHAPTER XXXII.

RETURN OF JAY'S TREATY--IT IS PROCLAIMED TO BE THE LAW OF THE
LAND--THE OPPOSITION OFFENDED--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES CALL UPON
THE PRESIDENT FOR ALL PAPERS RELATING TO THE TREATY--DEBATES
THEREON--ACTION OF THE CABINET--THE PRESIDENT'S REPLY--HE REFUSES TO
ACCEDE TO THE CALL OF THE HOUSE--CONSIDERATION OF HIS REFUSAL IN THE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES--BLOUNT'S RESOLUTIONS--DEBATES ON THE
TREATY--SPEECHES OF MADISON, GALLATIN, AND AMES--EFFECT OF AMES'S
SPEECH--DECISION OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE HOUSE--FINAL VOTE.

The treaty with Great Britain, ratified by King George, was returned to
the United States government in February, much to the relief of its
friends, and indeed of all parties. "We are wasting our time in the most
insipid manner, waiting for the treaty," wrote John Adams to his wife on
the tenth of January. "Nothing of any consequence will be done till that
arrives, and is mauled and abused, and then acquiesced in. For the
_antis_ must be more numero