nd I trust never will stain,
our national character. You are considered by them as not only having
rendered important service in our own revolution, but as being, on a
more extensive scale, the friend of human rights, and a distinguished
and able advocate in favour of public liberty. To the welfare of Thomas
Paine, the Americans are not, nor can they be, indifferent.

"Of the sense which the President has always entertained of your merits,
and of his friendly disposition towards you, you are too well assured
to require any declaration of it from me. That I forward his wishes
in seeking your safety is what I well know, and this will form an
additional obligation on me to perform what I should otherwise consider
as a duty.

"You are, in my opinion, at present menaced by no kind of danger.
To liberate you, will be an object of my endeavours, and as soon as
possible. But you must, until that event shall be accomplished, bear
your situation with patience and fortitude. You will likewise have the
justice to recollect, that I am placed here upon a difficult theatre*
many important objects to attend to, with few to consult It becomes me
in pursuit of those to regulate my conduct in respect to each, as to
the manner and the time, as will, in my judgment, be best calculated to
accomplish the whole.

"With great esteem and respect consider me personally your friend,

"James Monroe."

The part in Mr. Monroe's letter, in which he speaks of the President,
(Mr. Washington,) is put in soft language. Mr. Monroe knew what Mr.
Washington had said formerly, and he was willing to keep that in view.
But the fact is, not only that Mr. Washington had given no orders to Mr.
Monroe, as the letter [of Whiteside] stated, but he did not so much as
say to him, enquire if Mr. Paine be dead or alive, in prison or out, or
see if there be any assistance we can give him.

This I presume alludes to the embarrassments which the
strange conduct of Gouverneur Morris had occasioned, and
which, I well know, had created suspicions of the sincerity
of Mr. Washington.--_Author_. voi. m--ij

While these matters were passing, the liberations from the prisons were
numerous; from twenty to forty in the course of almost every twenty-four
hours. The continuance of my imprisonment after a new Minister had
arrived immediately from America, which was now more than two months,
was a matter so obviously strange, that I found the character of th