7427. RETALIATION, France and.—[continued].
Our government contemplate
restoring the Frenchmen taken originally
in the same vessel, and kept at Lancaster
[Penna.] as prisoners. This has furnished the
idea of calling her a cartel vessel, and pretending
that she came as such for an exchange of
prisoners, which is false. She was delivered
free and without condition, but it does not suit
to let any new evidence appear of the desire of
conciliation in France.—
To Edmund Pendleton. Washington ed. iv, 290.
Ford ed., vii, 360.
(Pa.,
Feb. 1799)
