to reject a project which promises a saving to the United States hundreds of thousands, under a pretext of curtailing an expence of 10 or 20 thousand dollars. If he acted from want of confidence in the success of the project, he was moved by a zeal withcut knowledge. Information he may have received from Captains S. Barron and Bainbridge must have been presumptive; for those commanders, not having been for the eight months last past in this quarter, can be but very imperfectly informed of the whole facts and entire object which those arrangements embrace. They can, in fact, have no information on the subject, except by mere intimation, other than what they derive from my dispatches, above alluded to, passed open through their hands ; to which, however, it is manifest, they paid no respect; except such parts of them as may have been construed to have reference to individual delinquency. But to whom are gentlemen, intrusted with, and fresh in, command here, to look for information? To the local and proper Agents of the government stationed here to watch for the interests of the United States; or to the theatres of Saragosa, Leghorn and Malaga? * * TO MR. MADISON. Tunis, Aug. 5th, 1802, * ON the 23d ult. I fell in with a Tripoline merchant at the Swedish house, who informed me that the circumstance of Mahamet Bashaw being at Malta, had excited great emotion at Tripoli ; that the reigning Bashaw was much alarmed; and that to prevent an insurrection in the interior in favor of the brother, the Bashaw had seized and confined several chiefs of principal villages. On the contrary, that his subjects build on this circumstance a hope of returning peace and a milder administration. That a spirit of universal discontentment and revolt pervade all classes of the subjects, except a few : personally attached to the reigning Bashaw and that they generally think it the interposition of heaven that their rightful sovereign is to be restored to them and their oppressor punished. I do not vouch for the truth of these facts; though they correspond with every thing which has come to my knowledge on the subject. To his EXCELLENCY MAHAMET CARAMELLI, BASH. AW of TRIPOLI. Tunis, Aug. 6th, 1802. SIR, I HAVE had the honor to receive your Excellency's letter of 16th ult. and I improve this first opportunity to request Mr. Puiis to furnish you with two thousand hard dollars on the credit of the United States, which, I hope will be a relief to your situation until the arrival of our Commodore, who is hourly expected here. He arrived at Gibraltar early in June; but has been detained in that quarter for the arrangement of public affairs with the Emperor of Morocco. I hope your Excellency's patience will not be exhausted. Remember that your brother thirsts for your blood. I have learned from a certain source that his project of getting you to Derne was to murder you. He is now more determined than ever; because he has intercepted some of your letters to your friends in Tripoli. You cannot be safe therefore, in any part of your Regency, unless you enter it in your true character of sovereign. I believe in God, the mighty and the just, that this event is not far distant. In the mean time, permit me to recommend to your Excellency to keep up a correspondence with those of your party in Tripoli, and with your subjects of the country. Let them be persuaded that your friends will not abandon you until, by the help of God, they shall see you restored to your faithful people. Give them assurances to redress their grievances and to treat them like a mild and just prince. And do every thing to detach them from the interest of the usurper. I have the honor to be, Sir, with the most profound respect, WILLIAM EATON. To MR. MADISON. Tunis, Aug. 9th, 1802. WHATEVER may be Capt. Murray's opinion of my measures, he ought not to sacrifice the interests of service to individual resentments. Gov. ernment may as well send out quaker meeting-houses to float about this sea as frigates with Murrays in command: the friendly salutes he may receive and return at Gibraltar produce nothing at Tripoli. Have we but one Truxton and one Sterret in the United States ? The Arab camp, called to the defence of Tripoli, has undoubtedly been collected to defeat the project of Mahamet Bashaw, the exiled brother. What other internal enemy can the usurper fear? If so, this amounts to unquestionable evidence of the influence that measure might have had in the war with Tripoli if pushed to effect, But, perhaps, the proj ect is not lost. Let the reigning Bashaw exhaust his resources in useless defensive preparations, and fatigue his subjects with fruitless campaigning ; while the project in view, on the part of his enemy, is maturing for operation. I have communicated nothing of this project to Mr. Nissen, he not having a cypher corresponding with mine, and it being dangerous to commit it to an intelligible character: he appears totally uninformed of it. This Regency is creating new demands on us. I shall detail them seasonably, if necessary. Among them the original demand for a vessel of war. EXTRACT: TO GEN. S. SMITH, Baltimore, MEMBER of CONGRESS. Tunis, Aug. 19th, 1802. ABOUT the time the Bashaw of Tripoli had fixed his resolution to declare war against the United States, Mr. Cathcart, our Consul near that Regency, suggested to me, that Mahamet Bashaw, brother of the reigning Bashaw, to whom the subjects of that Regency were very much attached, being the rightful sovereign and then in Tunis, having been treacherously driven from the throne some years ago, might be used as an instrument in the hands of the United States, to chastise the temerity of the usurper, reestablish himself, and effect a cheap, honorable, and permanent peace to our country. I immediately entered into a concertation with the exiled Bashaw to this effect: and he gave me such assurances of the feasibility of the measure, together with such collateral information collected from other quarters, as left scarcely a doubt of its success, if managed with suitable address. Mr. Cathcart suggested the same project to government, and I reported to the proper department the steps I had taken in the measure. Last winter, being in an infirm state of health from the convalescence of a fever which had reduced me very low during the summer, I was advised by physicians to take a voyage at sea. Accordingly I embarked in the United States transport, the George Washington, on the 13th December, for Leghorn. Late in February, information came to me that Mahamet Bashaw was about to return to Tripoli, on overtures made to him by the reigning Bashaw; who, it seems, had become jealous of him in his actual situation. I immediately embarked for Tunis, in a Danish built ship of mine, called the Gloria, armed with fourteen twelve and six pounders ; navigated by thirty seven men, chiefly Americans; and commanded by Capt Jo : seph Bounds of Baltimore; where, on my arrival, I found the Bashaw on the point of departure, under the escort of about forty. Tripoline soldiers, for the province of Derne in the Regency of Tripoli, the government of which the usurper had promised him as an indemnity for the loss of his throne. My return to Tunis and arguments which I used, determined the Bashaw to change his resolution, and seek some secure asylum until the arrival of the American squadron. But the Bey of Tunis, whether suspicious of what was on foot, or from what other motives I know not, had refused him further supplies in his Regency. His departure therefore, had become a matter of necessity. I wished him to go to Leghorn and put himself into the hands of Mr. Cathcart but, surrounded with Turkish subjects of. his brother, as he was, left it not optional with him :and, though apprehensive of treachery on the part of his brother, he seemed to have no alternative but to submit to his destiny. Yet he expressed a desire by some means to be thrown into the hands of the Americans. Here being none of our ships of war in the vicinity, I dispatched Capt. Bounds to the Boston frigate, Capt. M'Niell, being the only commander on the coast, with a statement of facts; who embraced the project and sent Capt. Bounds back to me with instructions to hold the Gloria in service, at my disposition, until the arrival of the Commodore. In the mean time, before the Bashaw sailed, I obtained secret intelligence from this Bey's Prime Minister that the object of the usurper was to get possession of his brother in order to destroy him. L immediately communicated this intelligence to the Bashaw, who had now already embarked for his passage, and brought him to a resolution to go to Malta, and there wait the arrival of our Commodore, with whom he might proceed before Tripoli and demand the restitution of his Regency; as he had assurances that, in such case, the subjects in general,. who are much dissatisfied with the war, would revolt |