, "this second attempt to
convene the states for the purposes proposed by the report of the
partial representation at Annapolis in September, should also prove
abortive, it may be considered as unequivocal evidence that the states
are not likely to agree on any general measure which is to pervade the
union, and of course, that there is an end of the federal government.
The states which make this last dying essay to avoid this misfortune
would be mortified at the issue, and their deputies would return home
chagrined at their ill success and disappointment. This would be a
disagreeable circumstance to any one of them, but more particularly to
a person in my situation." His letters of consultation therefore, with
a few confidential friends, also requested information respecting
those points on which his own judgment might ultimately be formed. He
was particularly desirous of knowing how the proposition made by
Virginia was received in the other states, and what measures were
taken to contravene, or to give it effect. He inquired too with the
utmost solicitude how the members of the Cincinnati would receive his
appearance in convention, after declining to be rechosen the president
of that society.

The enlightened friends of the union and of republican government,
generally regarded the convention as a measure which afforded the best
chance for preserving liberty and internal peace. And those whose
hopes predominated over their fears, were anxious to increase the
probability of deriving from it every practicable good, by retaining
on the list of its members, the most conspicuous name of which America
could boast. But this opinion was not universal. Among those who felt
the importance of the crisis, and who earnestly wished that a free
government, competent to the preservation of the union, might be
established, there were some who despaired of a favourable issue to
the attempt, and who were therefore anxious to rescue their general
from the increased mortification which would attend its failure,
should he be personally engaged in it. They believed that all the
states would not be represented in the convention. In a letter of the
20th of January, 1787, Colonel Humphries, who was himself under this
impression, thus accounts for the omission of the federal men in the
assembly of Connecticut, to press the appointment of deputies. "The
reason," he said, "was a conviction that the persons who could be
elected were some of the be