self or his credentials to
the President, before he was received by him, without his consent
or consultation, and directly in contravention of the state of peace
existing, and declared to exist in the President's proclamation, and
incumbent on him to preserve till the constitutional authority should
otherwise declare. These proceedings became immediately, as was
naturally to be expected, the subject of complaint by the representative
here of that power against whom they would chiefly operate. The British
minister presented several memorials thereon, to which we gave the
answer of May the 15th, heretofore enclosed to you, corresponding in
substance with a letter of the same date written to Mr. Ternant, the
Minister of France then residing here, a copy of which I send herewith.
On the next day Mr. Genet reached this place, about five or six weeks
after he had arrived at Charleston, and might have been at Philadelphia,
if he had steered for it directly. He was immediately presented to the
President, and received by him as the Minister of the Republic; and as
the conduct before stated seemed to bespeak a design of forcing us into
the war without allowing us the exercise of any free will in the case,
nothing could be more assuaging than his assurance to the President at
his reception, which he repeated to me afterwards in conversation, and
in public to the citizens of Philadelphia in answer to an address from
them, that on account of our remote situation and other circumstances,
France did not expect that we should become a party to the war, but
wished to see us pursue our prosperity and happiness in peace. In a
conversation a few days after, Mr. Genet told me that M. de Ternant had
delivered him my letter of May the 15th. He spoke something of the case
of the Grange, and then of the armament at Charleston, explained the
circumstances which had led him to it before he had been received by
the government and had consulted its will, expressed a hope that the
President had not so absolutely decided against the measure but that he
would hear what was to be said in support of it, that he would write me
a letter on the subject, in which he thought he could justify it
under our treaty; but that if the President should finally determine
otherwise, he must submit; for that assuredly his instructions were to
do what would be agreeable to us. He accordingly wrote the letter of
May the 27th. The President took the case again into consider