The United States was at this time on the verge of war with Spain.  The Spanish Governor and Intendant remained in New Orleans after the cession, and by their conduct gave such offence that it finally became necessary to order them to leave.  Jefferson claimed, as part of Louisiana, portions of both West Florida and Texas.  The Spaniards refused to admit the justice of the claim and gathered in the disputed territories armies which, though small, outnumbered the few regular troops that Wilkinson had at his disposal.  More than once a collision seemed imminent.  The Westerners clamored for war, desiring above all things to drive the Spaniards by force from the debatable lands.  For some time Jefferson showed symptoms of yielding to their wishes; but he was too timid and irresolute to play a high part, and in the end he simply did nothing.  However, though he declined to make actual war on the Spaniards, he also refused to recognize their claims as just, and his peculiar, hesitating course, tended to inflame the Westerners, and to make them believe that their government would not call them to account for acts of aggression.  To Jackson doubtless Burr’s proposals seemed quite in keeping with what he hoped from the United States Government.  He readily fell in with views so like his own, and began to make preparations for an expedition against the Spanish dominions; an expedition which in fact would not have differed essentially from the expeditions he actually did make into the Spanish Floridas six or eight years afterward, or from the movement which still later his fellow Tennessean, Houston, headed in Texas.

    Burr and Wilkinson.

From Nashville Burr drifted down the Cumberland, and at Fort Massac, on the Ohio, he met Wilkinson, a kindred spirit, who possessed neither honor nor conscience, and could not be shocked by any proposal.  Moreover, Wilkinson much enjoyed the early stages of a seditious agitation, when the risk to himself seemed slight; and as he was at this time both the highest military officer of the United States, and also secretly in the pay of Spain, the chance to commit a double treachery gave an added zest to his action.  He entered cordially into Burr’s plans, and as soon as he returned to his headquarters, at St. Louis, he set about trying to corrupt his subordinates, and seduce them from their allegiance.

    Burr Visits New Orleans.

Meanwhile Burr passed down the Mississippi to New Orleans, where he found himself in the society of persons who seemed more willing than any others he had encountered to fall in with his plans.  Even here he did not clearly specify his purposes, but he did say enough to show that they bordered on the treasonable; and he was much gratified at the acquiescence of his listeners.  His gratification, however, was over-hasty.  The Creoles, and some of the Americans, were delighted to talk of their wrongs and to threaten any course of action which they thought might yield vengeance; but they had little intention of proceeding from words to deeds.  Claiborne, a straightforward and honest man, set his face like a flint against all of Burr’s doings.