point of view, Sir, I am in hopes you will see it.  The proceeding, indeed, if the British Consul has been rightly informed (and we have no other information of it), has been an act of disrespect towards the United States, to which its government cannot be inattentive:  a just sense of our own rights and duties, and the obviousness of the principle, are a security that no inconveniences will be permitted to arise from repetitions of it.

The purchase of arms and military accoutrements by an agent of the French government, in this country, with an intent to expert them to France, is the subject of another of the memorials.  Of this fact we are equally uninformed as of the former.  Our citizens have been always free to make, vend, and export arms.  It is the constant occupation and livelihood of some of them.  To suppress their callings, the only means perhaps of their subsistence, because a war exists in foreign and distant countries, in which we have no concern, would scarcely be expected.  It would be hard in principle, and impossible in practice.  The law of nations, therefore, respecting the rights of those at peace, does not require from them such an internal derangement in their occupations.  It is satisfied with the external penalty pronounced in the President’s proclamation, that of confiscation of such portion of these arms as shall fall into the hands of any of the belligerent powers on their way to the ports of their enemies.  To this penalty our citizens are warned that they will be abandoned; and that even private contraventions may work no inequality between the parties at war, the benefits of them will be left equally free and open to all.

The capture of the British ship Grange by the French frigate L’Embuscade has on inquiry been found to have taken place within the bay of Delaware and jurisdiction of the United States, as stated in your memorial of the 2nd instant.  The government is, therefore, taking measures for the liberation of the crew and restitution of the ship and cargo.’

It condemns, in the highest degree, the conduct of any of our citizens who may personally engage in committing hostilities at sea against any of the nations, parties to the present war, and will exert all the means with which the laws and constitution have armed them to discover such as offend herein, and bring them to condign punishment.  Of these dispositions I am authorized to give assurances to all the parties, without reserve.  Our real friendship for them all, our desire to pursue ourselves the path of peace, as the only one leading surely to prosperity, and our wish to preserve the morals of our citizens from being vitiated by courses of lawless plunder and murder, may assure you that our proceedings, in this respect, will be with good faith, fervor, and vigilance.  Instructions are consequently given to the proper law officer, to institute such proceedings as the laws will justify, for apprehending and punishing certain individuals of our citizens, suggested to have been concerned in enterprises of this kind, as mentioned in one of your memorials of the 8th instant.