with effect, for them to neglect any means of preserv¬ ing his attachment. Whatever might be the cause, great care seems to have been taken to secure the safe delivery of the pension for 1796.

Some time previous to the 20th of January of that year, the Baron de Carondelet shipped the sum of nine thousand six hundred and forty dollars, on board a royal galley, and though ostensibly addressed to Vincent Folch, directed it to be delivered to Don Thomas Portell, the commandant at New-Madrid, with the following letter:

"In the galley Victoria Bernardo Molino Patron, there has been sent to Don Vincent Folch, 9640 dollars, which sum, without making the least use of it, you will hold at my disposal, to deliver it the moment that an order may be presented to you by the American general Don James Wilkinson. God pre

serve you many years.

THE BARON DE CARONDELET.

New-Orleans, Jan. 20, 1796.”

In the mean time the general, whose extravagance always anticipated the salary of his corruption, was importunate for his pay, and he requested Mr. Thomas Power, who appears to be the agent in whom both parties had the highest confidence, to go to New-Orleans to receive the money. On his arrival he was informed of its being sent to New-Madrid, and he immediately returned with a letter from the secretary of the governor, D. Andreas Armesto, to apprise the general that his wages were ready. He charged Power to receive them, who came to NewMadrid for that purpose in June, but an unforeseen

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difficulty arose. Portell was by the above letter directed to deliver the money only to the general or his order. He seems to have considered this to. mean a written order, and as Power was unprovided with one, in order to show that he equally possessed the confidence of the Spanish government and of Wilkinson, he was obliged to write a letter to Portell, by which he enters into details extremely edifying on the present occasion, and on which I shall particularly remark in a subsequent part of this inquiry. He details his different missions, and the address with which he executed them. He tells them of his being sent to New-Orleans for this very money of the conversations he had with the governor and secretary of the means which he (Power) had recommended to conceal the money, by Wilkinson's special direction-of his return to Wilkinson with the secretary's letter, and of his coming now on purpose to receive the sum. He enlarges on the disappointment to the general, and the injury to the king's service that would result from any delay in making the remittance, and paints in very strong terms, the necessity of furnishing sugar and coffee in which to conceal the dollars. Portell seems to have yielded to the force of this reasoning, and to have acknowledged Power, by the tokens exhibited, as one of the initiated in the mysteries of the intrigue. He answers him on the different points, consents to deliver the money, and to furnish the sugar and coffee necessary to conceal it; and gives him the copy he had requested, of the Baron's official letter of the 20th of January.

After having received the money and the merchandise, Power departed, and escaping the vigilance of gen. Wayne, by whose orders he was diligently watched, he arrived at Louisville, with his charge; from thence he proceeded to Cincinnati, and applied to Wilkinson to know what he should do with the money, who directed him to pay it to Nolan. He did so, and the general afterwards ac knowledged that he had received it. These circumstances are proved by the letter from Carondelet to Portell, No. 14,) the correspondence between Power and Portell, (No. 15 and 16,) and the depo- ́ sition of Power, (No. 17.)

Some remarks may be necessary to show the force of this testimony, which will be found to be irresistible: The letter of Carondelet is certified to be a true copy by Portell, who died many years ago; he was commandant of the post, and his certificate of any paper among his records bore, by the Spanish laws, the faith of an exemplification. He could at that time have had no motive for a forgery of this nature-Power could have had none to have asked him to make it, and the baron they both knew was a man whose signature they could not have trifled with with impunity. This certified copy was given to Power at the time, as his warrant for delivering the money to Wilkinson. Portell's letter to Power is the original draft, sworn to be exact by him, and proved so better than a thousand oaths, by its internal evidence, and by the manner in which Portell's answer tallies with it. If this evidence wanted support, it would be abundantly found in the following docu

ments.

1st. The deposition of Mr. Derbigny, (No. 18,) a gentleman of great respectability at the bar of New-Orleans, then a resident at New-Madrid. He declares that he sold to Mr. Powers the coffee and sugar for the purpose of packing the dollars, and that the bags for that purpose were made in his family, and that the object both of Powers's negotiation and of the payment of the money, was communicated to him by a Spanish officer, and was generally known at the port. 2d. The deposition of Mr. Mercier, (No. 19,) then a clerk employed in the office of the Baron de Carondelet, who unequivocally asserts the agency of Power, the correspondence in cypher with Wilkinson, and the object of it.

3d. By the following extract of a letter from Andrew Ellicott, Esq. to general Wilkinson (the whole of the letter will be referred to in another branch of this inquiry).“ About the 16th of October, 1799, captain Portell, who then commanded at Apalachy, informed me that at New-Madrid, in the year 1796, he put on board a boat under the direction of Mr. Thomas Power, 9640 dollars for your use. I questioned him frequently whether this money was not on account of some mercantile transaction-he declared it was not; he likewise mentioned several other gentlemen who received money from the Spanish government by the same conveyance, and assured me that they were considered as pensioners by the officers of his catholic majesty. I entered the sum of 9640 dollars on a piece of paper now in my possession, and handed it to captain Portell, who told me it was correct,"

On Mr. Power's arrival at New-Madrid, when sent down by Wilkinson for the money, he found, as was stated, a difficulty arising from the want of an order; this produced the correspondence between him and Portell above cited. Mr. Power thought it necessary to account for the apparent indiscretion of his communications to Portell, and therefore wrote the letters to the Baron de Carondelet and governor Gayoso (No. 20 and 21, dated 27th June). On his return to New-Madrid, after the delivery of the money, he again apprised both these officers of his return and the success of his mission, in two letters; (No. 22 and 23, Dated 3d January 1797;) the original drafts of those letters are now in my possession, and I beg the reader to attend to these documents, not only for the light they throw on this particular point, but for their referring to dispatches in cypher from Wilkinson, and instructions brought by Nolan, both of great importance in the subsequent part of this inquiry.

In addition to those corroborative proofs, a multitude of other depositions can be had whenever the legal inquiry is instituted; these, however, will suffice to prove, I think undeniably, the payment of the several sums I have mentioned by the Spanish government to an American general. Before we proceed to demonstrate the falsity of his excuse, that the sums he received were the prices of his tobacco, I must advert to two other circumstances, which are not supported by positive proof, but which, connected with the other facts, are extremely suspiious. The one is the 4000 dollars mentioned by