Having thus early divined Burr’s purpose of extracting money from the British he should not have been surprised when, six months later, he found himself the object of financial solicitation. Burr did not personally approach Yrujo. He sent as his emissary his old friend Jonathan Dayton, the ex-Senator from New Jersey. The visit took place in Philadelphia where Dayton was already present and to which Burr repaired after his last apparently futile appeal to Merry. Dayton, according to Yrujo’s report to Cevallos, explained that the reason of his visit was that he had information, known only to three persons in the country, which he thought would be worth thirty or forty thousand dollars to the Spanish Government. When Yrujo encouraged him to proceed Dayton disclosed the story of Burr’s secret conferences with Merry. It included the plan for taking the Floridas and for effecting the separation and independence of the western states. The Floridas, said Dayton, were to be associated with the new federated state, and for her share in bringing it about England was to receive a preference in matters of commerce and navigation. The plan, he continued, had obtained the approval of the British Minister who had recommended it to his Government. Dayton added that on his trip to the West Burr had found the people of that section not only disposed toward independence but also anxious to make an expedition against the kingdom of Mexico. The proposal, said Dayton, had been well received by the British Cabinet. In his previous letter to Cevallos, Yrujo had spoken of Burr’s proposed expedition into Mexico as chimerical. Surely nothing was more chimerical than his present plan to help pay for it by frightening the Spaniards into giving him money for warning him of what was going to happen to them. General Jackson and other prominent westerners who were enthusiastic over such an expedition and had hailed Burr as the leader no doubt would have been astonished had they known that he was thus divulging his plans to the Spaniards in the hope of getting money from them. But in this instance Yrujo was not so easily fooled. He did not believe that the British Government had fallen for the plan as Dayton asserted. Yrujo reasoned that, had they done so, Burr and Dayton would not now be coming to him. He was quite aware that Dayton, while pretending to betray the plot, had actually been sent by Burr. Yrujo did not commit himself. He dismissed the ex-Senator courteously, promising to talk to him again. Burr and Dayton appear to have realized that they had overplayed their hand. A few days later Dayton paid a return visit. This time he confessed that Burr’s plan had not been received with enthusiasm by the British ministry.