ion may be pardoned to a
multitude acting from the impulse of the moment. But we cannot expect
a foreign nation to show that apathy to the answers of the President,
which are more thrasonic than the addresses. Whatever chance for peace
might have been left us after the publication of the despatches, is
completely lost by these answers. Nor is it France alone, but his own
fellow-citizens, against whom his threats are uttered. In Fenno, of
yesterday, you will see one, wherein he says to the address from
Newark, 'The delusions and misrepresentations which have misled so
many citizens, must be discountenanced by authority as well as by
the citizens at large'; evidently alluding to those letters from the
Representatives to their constituents, which they have been in the habit
of seeking after and publishing: while those sent by the tory part
of the House to their constituents, are ten times more numerous, and
replete with the most atrocious falsehoods and calumnies. What new
law they will propose on this subject, has not yet leaked out. The
citizen-bill sleeps. The alien-bill, proposed by the Senate, has not yet
been brought in. That proposed by the House of Representatives has been
so moderated, that it will not answer the passionate purposes of the war
gentlemen. Whether, therefore, the Senate will push their bolder plan, I
know not. The provisional army does not go down so smoothly in the House
as it did in the Senate. They are whittling away some of its choice
ingredients; particularly that of transferring their own constitutional
discretion over the raising of armies to the President. A committee of
the Representatives have struck out his discretion, and hang the
raising of the men on the contingencies of invasion, insurrection, or
declaration of war. Were all our members here, the bill would not pass.
But it will, probably, as the House now is. Its expense is differently
estimated, from five to eight millions of dollars a year. Their purposes
before voted, require two millions above all the other taxes, which,
therefore, are voted to be raised on lands, houses, and slaves. The
provisional army will be additional to this. The threatening appearances
from the alien-bills have so alarmed the French who are among us, that
they are going off. A ship, chartered by themselves for this purpose,
will sail within about a fortnight for France, with as many as she can
carry. Among these I believe will be Volney, who has in truth bee