CHAPTER leasing those American citizens who had been imprisXIII. oned under the embargo recently imposed on American 1798. shipping, and a second raising that embargo—a thing,

however, of little consequence, as there were at this time few American ships in French ports. By a circular letter of the same date with the decree rescinding the embargo, the minister of Marine gave directions to the French cruisers that no injury should be done to the officers or crews of American vessels found to be "in order," or to the passengers or crew, if citizens of the United States, and properly provided with passports or protections. Use was also made of the ready agency of Fulwar Skipwith, the American consul general at Paristhe protegé of Monroe-who, with Barlow, Barney, and Thomas Paine, might be considered a chief leader of the Aug. 22. renegade Americans in France, to convey assurances to the American government-founded, however, on no more trustworthy evidence than Skipwith's private opinion— that the Directory intended to urge upon the legislative body a revision of the maritime laws, with a view to the organization of a system such as would secure "the most important rights of neutrality on the seas." But even Skipwith seemed to think that, owing to particular circumstances, it would require some considerable time to dispose the French Legislature to make such changes in the laws as would cause the privateers and the tribunals "to respect neutrals in general, and the flag of the United States in particular;" yet he was happy to add that the High Court of Cassation, before which appeals were pending as to most of the vessels captured, were disposed to procrastinate, so as to give time for the passage of the new laws. Until those laws were passed, it would be impossible for the Directory, however well disposed, to alter the course of the tribunals.

XIII.

Some consolation was found for the departure of Ger- CHAPTER ry in the arrival, just afterward, of Dr. Logan, whose departure from the United States has been already men- 1798. tioned, and who was represented in the Paris newspapers, particularly one edited by Citizen Paine, as the envoy, not, indeed, of the Federal government, but of those states favorable to the French interest. Logan was received. and feasted with great eclât by Talleyrand and Merlin, and he soon departed on his homeward voyage with new and reiterated assurances, not, however, in writing, of the desire of the French government to treat. Indeed, as we shall presently see, an attempt to re-establish diplomatic communication with the United States, on ground much more moderate than any hitherto insisted upon, was already on foot, through the agency of the French secretary of legation at the Hague, who had been author. ized to communicate on that subject with Murray, the American minister to the Batavian republic.

Though Gerry's intentions in entering into a secret correspondence with Talleyrand apart from his colleagues, and in remaining at Paris after their departure, were doubtless patriotic, originating in his extreme anxiety for the preservation of peace, and in the hope that he might become the instrument for bringing about a reconciliation between the two nations, his efforts in the matter, as is apt to be the case with unsuccessful experiments, do not appear to have given much satisfaction to any body. His colleague Pinckney had written home "that he had never met with a man so destitute of candor and full of deceit." Talleyrand, with a juster appreciation of Gerry's weak points-a virtuous weakness which he could not be persuaded to overcome-declared that he wanted decision at a moment when he might have easily adjusted every thing; that he was too irres

CHAPTER olute; and that the correspondence between them was a XIIL curious monument of advances on his part, and evasions

1798. on Gerry's."

Skipwith, in a letter to Jefferson, written before the departure of the other two envoys, speaking for himself and the other renegade Americans at Paris, informed that head of the opposition that "they could perceive in Gerry but the shadow of what they had presumed he was. We learn in secret whispers from this good old gentleman (for I venerate the chastity of his moral character, while I regret that he has not courage to shape a political course congenial to the crisis here) that he has a hard and cruel task to think and act with his two associates, and that, were he alone, he would be able to stop the frightful breach between the two countries. But I am apprehensive that his paralytic mind would prove too weak to invent, and his arm too feeble to apply the remedy which the disease demands. In fact, no one but a pronounced Republican and friend of the French Revolution, and a man unfettered by the forms and school-readings of Adams and Pickering, could stand a chance to heal the wounds which are now bleeding."

The means of healing these bleeding wounds recommended by this patriotic consul general were simply these: "Tis to confess some of our errors, to lay their sins heavily upon the shoulders of a few persons who have perpetrated them, to modify or break the English treaty with Jay, and to lend France as much money, should she ask it, as she lent us in the hour of distress. I am aware that the pride of some, the knavery of many, and the ignorance of others would pretend to execrate the act; but imperious necessity commands, and the genius of republican liberty would sanction it." With such a consul general in close communion and sympathy with

XIII.

the French government on the one hand, and with the CHAPTER leaders of the American opposition on the other, who, it. was believed, would soon rise to the head of affairs, what 1798. need have we to wonder at the insolence of Talleyrand and the Directory? Barlow had written, about the same time, a similar letter to his brother-in-law Baldwin, some extracts from which have been already quoted in giving an account of Lyon's trial.

But if Gerry's conduct gave no satisfaction abroad, whether to his fellow-envoys, to the French government, or to the American partisans of France, it found hardly more favor at home. The Federalists execrated his separation from his colleagues and his delay in France as acts of timidity and weakness, if not of treachery. So highly was the indignation of his immediate neighbors raised against him, that his wife and young family, then resident at Cambridge, near Boston, became, as his biographer complains, the object of some of those disgraceful annoyances which it had been customary to play off at the commencement of the Revolution against some of the old Tories, and to which, at that time, perhaps Gerry himself had not much objected. "Letters, anonymous or feigned, were sent to Mrs. Gerry, imputing his continuance in France to causes most distressing to a wife and mother. Yells were uttered and bonfires were kindled at night about the house, and on one occasion a guillotine was erected under the window, smeared with blood, and bearing the effigy of a headless man."

But if the Federalists were indignant, the opposition, on the other hand, were no better satisfied; for in finally leaving France without making any treaty, or bringing with him any definite proposals, he seemed to have furnished unanswerable proofs of the falsehood and perfidy of the French government.

CHAPTER olute; and that the correspondence between them was a XIIL curious monument of advances on his part, and evasions 1798. on Gerry's."

Skipwith, in a letter to Jefferson, written before the departure of the other two envoys, speaking for himself and the other renegade Americans at Paris, informed that head of the opposition that "they could perceive in Gerry but the shadow of what they had presumed he was. We learn in secret whispers from this good old gentleman (for I venerate the chastity of his moral character, while I regret that he has not courage to shape a political course congenial to the crisis here) that he has a hard and cruel task to think and act with his two associates, and that, were he alone, he would be able to stop the frightful breach between the two countries. But I am apprehensive that his paralytic mind would prove too weak to invent, and his arm too feeble to apply the rem edy which the disease demands. In fact, no one but a pronounced Republican and friend of the French Revolution, and a man unfettered by the forms and school-readings of Adams and Pickering, could stand a chance to heal the wounds which are now bleeding."

The means of healing these bleeding wounds recommended by this patriotic consul general were simply these: "Tis to confess some of our errors, to lay their sins heavily upon the shoulders of a few persons who have perpetrated them, to modify or break the English treaty with Jay, and to lend France as much money, should she ask it, as she lent us in the hour of distress. I am aware that the pride of some, the knavery of many, and the ignorance of others would pretend to execrate the act; but imperious necessity commands, and the genius of republican liberty would sanction it." With such a consul general in close communion and sympathy with