“The whole matter reduces itself to a blunder (_gaucherie_) of the Intendant,” said Cevallos; “it has been finally explained to Mr. Jefferson, and friendship is restored. On both sides there has been irritation, but not a shadow of aggression; and from the moment of coming to an understanding, both parties see that they are at bottom of one mind, and mutually very well disposed toward each other. Moreover, it is quite gratuitous to assume that Louisiana is so easy to take in the event of a war, either by the Americans or by the English. The first have only militia,--very considerable, it is true, but few troops of the line; while Louisiana, at least for the moment, has ten thousand militia-men, and a body of three thousand five hundred regular troops. As for the English, they cannot seriously have views on a province which is impregnable to them; and all things considered, it would be no great calamity if they should take it. The United States, having a much firmer hold on the American continent, should they take a new enlargement, would end by becoming formidable, and would one day disturb the Spanish possessions. As for the debts due to Americans, Spain has still more claim to an arrangement of that kind; and in any case the King, as Bonaparte must know, would have gladly discharged all the debts contracted by France, and perhaps even a large instalment of the American claim, in order to recover an old domain of the crown. Finally, the intention which led the King to give his consent to the exchange of Louisiana was completely deceived. This intention had been to interpose a strong dyke between the Spanish colonies and the American possessions; now, on the contrary, the doors of Mexico are to stay open to them.” To these allegations, which Beurnonville called “insincere, weak, and ill-timed,” Cevallos added a piece of evidence which, strangely enough, was altogether new to the French minister, and reduced him to confusion: it was Gouvion St.-Cyr’s letter, pledging the First Consul never to alienate Louisiana. When Beurnonville’s despatch narrating these interviews reached Paris, it stung Bonaparte to the quick, and called from him one of the angry avowals with which he sometimes revealed a part of the motives that influenced his strange mind. Talleyrand wrote back to Beurnonville, June 22, a letter which bore the mark of the First Consul’s hand.