This is a bitter letter, but it is still more a sorrowful one. In view of what Washington had written of Paine's services, and for the sake of twelve years of _camaraderie_, Washington should have overlooked the sharpness of a deeply wronged and dying friend, and written to him what his Minister in France had reported. My reader already knows, what the sufferer knew not, that a part of Paine's grievance against Washington was unfounded. Washington could not know that the only charge against Paine was one trumped up by his own Minister in France. Had he considered the letter just quoted, he must have perceived that Paine was laboring under an error in supposing that no inquiry had been made into his case. There are facts antecedent to the letter showing that his complaint had a real basis. For instance, in a letter to Monroe (July 30th), President's interest was expressed in two other American prisoners in France--Archibald Hunter and Shubael Allen,--but no word was said of Paine. There was certainly a change in Washington towards Paine, and the following may have been its causes. 1. Paine had introduced Genêt to Morris, and probably to public men in America. Genêt had put an affront on Morris, and taken over a demand for his recall, with which Morris connected Paine. In a letter to Washington (private) Morris falsely insinuated that Paine had incited the actions of Genêt which had vexed the President. 2. Morris, perhaps in fear that Jefferson, influenced by Americans in Paris, might appoint Paine to his place, had written to Robert Morris in Philadelphia slanders of Paine, describing him as a sot and an object of contempt. This he knew would reach Washington without passing under the eye of Paine's friend, Jefferson. 3. In a private letter Morris related that Paine had visited him with Colonel Oswald, and treated him insolently. Washington particularly disliked Oswald, an American journalist actively opposing his administration. 4. Morris had described Paine as intriguing against him, both in Europe and America, thus impeding his mission, to which the President attached great importance. 5. The President had set his heart on bribing England with a favorable treaty of commerce to give up its six military posts in America. The most obnoxious man in the world to England was Paine. Any interference in Paine s behalf would not only have offended England, but appeared as a sort of repudiation of Morris' intimacy with the English court. The (alleged) reclamation of Paine by Morris had been kept secret by Washington even from friends so intimate (at the time) as Madison, who writes of it as having never been done. So carefully was avoided the publication of anything that might vex England. 6. Morris had admonished the Secretary of State that if Paine's imprisonment were much noticed it might endanger his life. So conscience was free to jump with policy.