Impressed and shocked, Jackson acted with characteristic directness. He ordered Coffee to accept no more contracts from Burr. He penned a letter to Burr in strong terms, telling him of his suspicions and warning him that until they were cleared from his mind he wished no further intimacy to exist between them. While Jackson had only suspicions of Burr he appears to have been convinced of the guilt of Wilkinson, whom he had known in years past, with whom he had had business dealings, and for whom he had no love. To Gov. William C. C. Claiborne, of the New Orleans territory, he dispatched a dramatic warning: “Indeed I fear treachery has become the order of the day.... Put your town in a state of defense. Organize your militia and defend your city as well against internal enemies as external.... Be upon the alert; and keep a watchful eye upon the General [Wilkinson] and beware of an attack as well from our own country as Spain.” In his idle moments at the Hermitage between horse races and duels General Jackson must have been dipping into Shakespeare. The letter continued: “I fear there is something rotten in the State of Denmark.... Beware the month of December. I love my country and government, I hate the Dons; I would delight to see Mexico reduced; but I will die in the last ditch before I yield a foot to the Dons, or see the Union disunited. This I write for your own eyes, and for your safety; profit by it and the Ides of March remember.” To Jackson’s demand for an explanation Burr gave prompt attention. According to the General he answered “with the most sacred pledges that he had not, nor never had, any views inimical or hostile to the United States, and whenever he was charged with the intention of separating the Union, the idea of insanity must be ascribed to him.” General Jackson was not the only one demanding reassurances from Burr. When Burr was about to appear before the Kentucky Grand Jury at Frankfort he asked Henry Clay to defend him. Clay, too, wanted to hear from Burr’s own lips whether there was any substance to the charges that had been preferred by Daveiss and the _Western World_ before accepting the commission. From Burr he got this categorical denial: “I have no design, nor have I taken any measure, to promote a dissolution of the Union or a separation of any one or more States from the residue.... I do not own a musket nor a bayonet, nor any single article of military stores, nor does any person for me, by my authority or with my knowledge.... Considering the high station you now fill in our national councils, I have thought these explanations proper, as well as to counteract chimerical tales, which malevolent persons have so industriously circulated, as to satisfy you that you have not espoused the cause of a man in any way unfriendly to the laws, the government or the interests of his country.”