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Introduction.

republicanism in his masterly leadership in the first years of the Continental Congress. The distrust was probably mutual, but the President was the one to whom confidence and coöperation were due, and instead of that the Vice-President was the leader of the opposition and his rival for the suffrages of the people. The situation was too much for the administration. The President early gave offence by inauspicious speeches in regard to the relation of British and French influences, and kindred matters. The friends of France took especial exception to a remark to the effect that the American and French revolutions possessed not one point in common. Madison and Jefferson criticised this utterance freely in their correspondence, and it became the text for a public warning against a man who could hold such an opinion. Meanwhile our relations with France were growing more and more complicated. The performances of Genet produced a great revulsion of feeling on the part of many ardent French sympathizers. And from the time of his coming there was never quite the same feeling that had once prevailed. When Washington left office Adet's commission was suspended, and though he continued in Philadelphia, he was no longer accredited to the government. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney had set out bearing Monroe's recall and his own credentials to St. Denis. When he arrived he was received with much hauteur, and finally informed that the Directory declined to recognize him. All this had transpired in the last days of Washington's administration, but the news