Burr’s appearance on the Ohio and at St. Louis in Wilkinson’s company during the summer of 1805 called attention to the old Spanish conspiracy, and gave Daveiss the opportunity he wanted. As early as Jan. 10, 1806, while Burr was still struggling at Washington to save his plot from collapse for want of foreign aid, and while John Randolph was beginning his invectives in Congress, the district-attorney wrote to the President a private letter denouncing the old Spanish plot, and declaring that it was still alive.[185] “A separation of the Union in favor of Spain is the object _finally_. I know not what are the means.” Assuming that Jefferson was ignorant of the facts, because he had “appointed General Wilkinson as Governor of St. Louis, who, I am convinced, has been for years, and now is, a pensioner of Spain,” Daveiss asserted his own knowledge, and contented himself with a general warning;-- “This plot is laid wider than you imagine. Mention the subject to no man from the Western country, however high in office he may be. Some of them are deeply tainted with this treason. I hate duplicity of expression; but on this subject I am not authorized to be explicit, nor is it necessary. You will despatch some fit person into the Orleans country to inquire.” February 10 Daveiss wrote again calling attention to Burr’s movements during the previous summer, and charging both him and Wilkinson with conspiracy.[186] At about the time when these letters arrived, the President received another warning from Eaton. The air was full of denunciations, waiting only for the President’s leave to annihilate the conspirators under popular contempt. A word quietly written by Jefferson to one or two persons in the Western country would have stopped Burr short in his path, and would have brought Wilkinson abjectly on his knees. A slight change in the military and naval arrangements at New Orleans would have terrified the creoles into good behavior, and would have made Daniel Clark denounce the conspiracy. The President showed Daveiss’s letter to Gallatin, Madison, and Dearborn; but he did not take its advice, and did not, in his Cabinet memoranda of October 22,[187] mention it among his many sources of information. February 15 he wrote to Daveiss[188] a request to communicate all he knew on the subject. No other acts followed, nor was either Wilkinson or Burr put under surveillance.