of secrecy, a letter to be delivered to Burr at Lexington. Taylor reached Lexington October 25, found Burr, delivered his letters, and candidly added: "If you come up our way the people will shoot you." The following Monday, October 27, the gardener started on his return, taking Blennerhassett with him, and leaving Burr at Lexington to face the storms that threatened from many quarters at once.
The impossibility of returning to the island was but one warning; another came from Senator Smith, who dreaded exposure. The letter he sent by Peter Taylor, dated October 23, affected ignorance of Burr's schemes, and demanded an explanation of them. October 26 Burr sent the required disavowal:—
- "I was greatly surprised and really hurt," said Burr[1], "by the unusual tenor of your letter of the 23d, and I hasten to reply to it, as well for your satisfaction as my own. If there exists any design to separate the Western from the Eastern States, I am totally ignorant of it. I never harbored or expressed any such intention to any one, nor did any person ever intimate such design to me."
From that moment to the last day of his life Burr persisted in this assertion, coupling it always in his own mind with a peculiar reservation. What he so solemnly denied was the intention to separate the Western States "by force" from the Eastern; what he never denied was the plan of establishing a Western empire by consent.
- ↑ Burr to John Smith, Oct. 26, 1806; Senate Report, p. 33.
