ing under British influence, and being directed by her counsels, or as being her pensioners."

Shortly before this sharp definition was written, an incident had occurred which had given Washington an opportunity of impressing his views directly and personally upon a distinguished leader of the opposite party. Dr. Logan of Philadelphia, under the promptings of Jefferson, as was commonly supposed, had gone on a volunteer mission to Paris for the purpose of bringing about peace between the two republics. He had apparently a fixed idea that there was something very monstrous in our having any differences with France, and being somewhat of a busybody, although a most worthy man, he felt called upon to settle the international complications which were then puzzling the brains and trying the patience of the ablest men in America. It is needless to say that his mission was not a success, and he was eventually so unmercifully ridiculed by the Federalist editors that he published a long pamphlet in his own defence. Upon his return, however, he seems to have been not a little pleased with himself, and he took occasion to call upon Washington, who was then in Philadelphia on business. It would be difficult to conceive anything more distasteful to Washington than such a mission as Logan's, or that he could have a more hearty contempt for any one than for a meddler of this description, who by his interference might help to bring his country into contempt. He was sufficiently impressed, however,

by Dr. Logan's call to draw up a memorandum, which gave a very realistic and amusing account of it. It may be surmised that when Washington wished to be cold in his manner, he was capable of being very freezing, and he was not very apt at concealing his emotions when he found himself in the presence of any one whom he disliked and disapproved. The memorandum is as follows:

"Tuesday, November 13, 1798. - Mr. Lear, my secretary, being from our lodgings on business, one of my servants came into the room where I was writing and informed me that a gentleman in the parlor below desired to see me; no name was sent up. In a few minutes I went down, and found the Rev. Dr. Blackwell and Dr. Logan there. I advanced towards and gave my hand to the former; the latter did the same towards me. I was backward in giving mine. He, possibly supposing from hence that I did not recollect him, said his name was Logan. Finally, in a very cold manner, and with an air of marked indifference, I gave him my hand and asked Dr. Blackwell to be seated; the other took a seat at the same time. I addressed all my conversation to Dr. Blackwell; the other all his to me, to which I only gave negative or affirmative answers as laconically as I could, except asking him how Mrs. Logan did. He seemed disposed to be very polite, and while Dr. Blackwell and myself were conversing on the late calamitous fever, offered me an asylum at his house, if it should return or I thought myself in any danger

in the city, and two or three rooms, by way of accommodation. I thanked him slightly, observing there would be no call for it."

"About this time Dr. Blackwell took his leave. We all rose from our seats, and I moved a few paces toward the door of the room expecting the other would follow and take his leave also."

The worthy Quaker, however, was not to be got rid of so easily. He literally stood his ground, and went on talking of a number of things chiefly about Lafayette and his family, and an interview with Mr. Murray, our minister in Holland. Washington, meanwhile, stood facing him, and to use his own words," showed the utmost inattention," while his visitor described his journey to Paris. Finally Logan said that his purpose in going to France was to ameliorate the condition of our relations

with that country. "This," said Washington, "drew my attention more pointedly to what he was saying and induced me to remark that there was something very singular in this; that he, who could only be viewed as a private character, unarmed with proper powers, and presumptively unknown in France, should suppose he could effect what three gentlemen of the first respectability in our country, especially charged under the authority of the government, were unable to do." One is not surprised to be then told that Dr. Logan seemed a little confounded at this observation; but he recovered himself, and went on to say that only five persons knew of his going, and that his letters from

Mr. Jefferson and Mr. McKean obtained for him an interview with M. Merlin, president of the Directory, who had been most friendly in his expressions. To this Washington replied with some very severe strictures on the conduct of France; and the conversation, which must by this time have become a little strained, soon after came to an end. One cannot help feeling a good deal of sympathy for the excellent doctor, although he was certainly a busybody and, one would naturally infer, a bore as well. It would have been, however, a pity to have lost this memorandum, and there is every reason to regret that Washington did not oftener exercise his evident powers for realistic reporting. Nothing, moreover, could bring out better his thorough contempt for the opposition and their attitude toward France than this interview with the volunteer commissioner.

There were, however, much more serious movements made by the Democratic party than wellmeant and meddling attempts to make peace with France. This was the year of the Kentucky and Virginia resolutions, the first note of that disunion sentiment which was destined one day to involve the country in civil war and be fought out on a hundred battlefields. Washington, with his love for the Union and for nationality ever uppermost in his heart, was quick to take alarm, and it cut him especially to think that a movement which he esteemed at once desperate and wicked should emanate from his own State, and as we now know,

and

as he perhaps suspected, from a great Virginian whom he had once trusted. He straightway set himself to oppose this movement with all his might, and he summoned to his aid that other great Virginian who in his early days had been the first to rouse the people against oppression, and who now in his old age, in response to Washington's appeal, came again into the forefront in behalf of the Constitution and the union of the States. The letter which Washington wrote to Patrick Henry on this occasion is one of the most important that he ever penned, but there is room to quote only a single passage here.

"At such a crisis as this," he said, "when everything dear and valuable to us is assailed, when this party hangs upon the wheels of government as a dead weight, opposing every measure that is calculated for defence and self-preservation, abetting the nefarious views of another nation upon our rights, preferring, as long as they dare contend openly against the spirit and resentment of the people, the interest of France to the welfare of their own country, justifying the former at the expense of the latter; when every act of their own government is tortured, by constructions they will not bear, into attempts to infringe and trample upon the Constitution with a view to introduce monarchy; when the most unceasing and the purest exertions which were making to maintain a neutrality are charged with being measures calculated to favor Great Britain at the expense of France, and all