One of the first moves of the Clintons was to get control of the Manhattan Bank. They caused John Swartwout, Burr’s associate director, to be turned out. Some words ensued, and De Witt Clinton styled Swartwout a liar, a scoundrel and a villain. Swartwout set about resenting the insult in the gentlemanly mode of the day. Clinton readily accepted a challenge, and five shots were fired, two of which hit Swartwout, who, upon being asked whether he had had enough said that he had not; but the duel was stopped by the seconds. While the Clintons were searching for a good pretext to overthrow Burr, the latter injudiciously supplied it himself when in 1804 he opposed the election of Morgan Lewis, his own party’s nominee for Governor. Burr’s action gave rise to much acrimony; and from that time he was ostracized by every part of the Republican party in New York except the chiefs of the Tammany Society, or Martling Men. He fell altogether into disgrace with the general public when he shot Alexander Hamilton in a duel, July 11, 1804. Tammany, however, still clung to him. Two of Tammany’s chiefs--Nathaniel Pendleton and William P. Van Ness--accompanied Burr to the field; John Swartwout, another chief, was at Burr’s house awaiting his return. The Tammany men looked upon much of the excitement over Hamilton’s death as manufactured. But as if to yield to public opinion, the society on July 13 issued a notice to its members to join in the procession to pay the “last tribute of respect to the _manes_ of Hamilton.” In the inflamed state of public feeling which condemned everything connected with Burr and caused his indictment in two States, the Sachems knew it would be unwise for a time to make any attempt to restore him to political power. They found their opportunity in December, 1805, when, strangely enough, De Witt Clinton, forced by the exigencies of politics, made overtures to form a union with the Burrites in order to resist the powerful Livingston family, which, with Gov. Morgan Lewis at its head, was threatening the Clinton family. The Burrites thought they would get the better of the bargain and be able to reinstate their chief. The negotiators met secretly February 20, 1806, at Dyde’s Hotel. John Swartwout and the other Tammany chiefs insisted as conditions of the union that Burr should be recognized as a Republican; that his friends should be well cared for in the distribution of offices, and that “Burrism” should never be urged as an objection against them. The Clintons, anxious to beat down the Livingstons, were ready to agree to these terms, knowing that Burr’s prestige was utterly swept away and that any effort of his followers to thrust him forward again would be a failure. Clintonites and Burrites set to drinking hilariously as a token of good will. But their joy was premature.