[Illustration:  John Adams]

%234.  Trouble with France.%—­Adams was inaugurated on March 4, 1797, and three days later heard that C. C. Pinckney, our minister to the French Republic, had been driven from France.  Pinckney had been sent to France by Washington in 1796, but the French Directory (as the five men who then governed France were called) had taken great offense at Jay’s treaty:  first because it was favorable to Great Britain, and in the second place because it put an end for the present to all hope of war between her and the United States.  The Directory, therefore, refused to receive Pinckney until the French grievances were redressed.

The President was very angry at the insult, and summoned Congress to meet and take such action as, said he, “shall convince France and the whole world that we are not a degraded people humiliated under a colonial spirit of fear and sense of inferiority.”  But the Republicans declared so vigorously that if a special mission were sent to France all would be made right, that Adams yielded, and sent John Marshall and Elbridge Gerry to join Pinckney as envoys extraordinary.  On reaching Paris, three men acting as agents for the Directory met them, and declared that before they could be received as ministers they must do three things: 

1.  Apologize for Adams’s denunciation of the conduct of France. 2.  Pay each Director $50,000. 3.  Pay tribute to France.

When the President reported this demand to Congress, the names of the three French agents were suppressed, and instead they were called Mr. X, Mr. Y, Mr. Z. This gave the mission the nickname “X, Y, Z mission.”

%235.  “Millions for Defense, not a Cent for Tribute."%—­As the newspapers published these dispatches, a roar of indignation, in which the Federalists and Republicans alike joined, went up from the whole country.  “Millions for defense, not a cent for tribute,” became the watchword of the hour.  Opposition in Congress ceased, and preparations were at once made for war.  The French treaties were suspended.  The Navy Department was created, and a Secretary of the Navy appointed.  Frigates were ordered to be built, money was voted for arms, a provisional army was formed, and Washington was again made commander in chief, with the rank of lieutenant general.  The young men associated for defense, the people in the seaports built frigates or sloops of war, and gave their services to erect forts and earthworks.  Every French flag was now pulled down from the coffeehouses, and the black cockade of our own Revolutionary days was once more worn as the badge of patriotism.  Then was written, by Joseph Hopkinson of Philadelphia,[1] and sung for the first time, our national song Hail, Columbia!

[Footnote 1:  The music to which we sing Hail, Columbia! was called The President’s March, and was played for the first time when the people of Trenton were welcoming Washington on his way to be inaugurated President in 1789.  For an account of the trouble with France read McMaster’s History of the People of the United States, Vol.  II, pp. 207-416, 427-476.]