rope, and under particular good
understanding with England, our other neighbor. In so delicate a
position, therefore, instead of expressing our sense of these things, by
way of answer to Messrs. Viar and Jaudenes, the President has thought
it better that it should be done to you, and to trust to your discretion
the moment, the measure, and the form of communicating it to the court
of Madrid. The actual state of Europe at the time you will receive this,
the solidity of the confederacy, and especially as between Spain and
England, the temper and views of the former, or of both, towards us,
the state of your negotiation, are circumstances which will enable you
better to decide how far it may be necessary to soften, or even perhaps
to suppress, the expressions of our sentiments on this subject. To your
discretion, therefore, it is committed by the President, to let the
court of Spain see how impossible it is for us to submit with folded
arms to be butchered by these savages, and to prepare them to view, with
a just eye, the more vigorous measures we must pursue to put an end to
their atrocities, if the moderate ones we are now taking should fail of
that effect.

Our situation on other accounts and in other quarters is critical. The
President is, therefore, constantly anxious to know the state of things
with you: and I entreat you to keep him constantly and well informed.
Mr. Yznardi, the younger, lately appointed Consul of the United States,
at Cadiz, may be a convenient channel of forwarding your letters.

I have the honor to be, with great esteem and respect, Gentlemen, your
most obedient and most humble servant,

Th: Jefferson.

LETTER CLII.--TO MR. GENET, June 5,1793

TO MR. GENET, _Minister Plenipotentiary of France_.

Philadelphia, June 5,1793.

Sir,

In my letter of May the 15th, to M. de Ternant, your predecessor, after
stating the answer which had been given to the several memorials of
the British Minister, of May the 8th, it was observed that a part
still remained unanswered of that which respected the fitting out armed
vessels in Charleston, to cruise against nations with whom we are at
peace.

In a conversation which I had afterwards the honor of holding with you,
I observed that one of those armed vessels, the Citizen Genet, had come
into this port with a prize: that the President had thereupon taken
the case into further consideration, and after mature consultation and
deliberation, was of