Reason" their Bible; "Atheist" and "Infidel" were added to the epithets
which the Federalists discharged at their foes. So fierce and so general
was the quarrel on this European ground, that a distinguished foreigner,
then travelling in this country, said that he saw many French and
English, but scarcely ever met with an American. Weld, a more humble
tourist, put into his book, that in Norfolk, Virginia, he found half the
town ready to fight the other half on the French question. Meanwhile,
both French and English treated us with ill-disguised contempt,
and inflicted open outrages upon our commerce. But it made little
difference. One faction was willing to be kicked by England; and the
other took a pleasure in being _souffleté_ by France. The rival flags
were kept flying until the close of the war of 1812.

An outbreak of Democratic fury bordering upon treason took place, when
Senator Mason of Virginia violated the oath of secrecy, and sent a
copy of Jay's treaty with England to the "Aurora." Meetings passed
condemnatory resolutions expressed in no mild language. Jay was "a
slave, a traitor, a coward, who had bartered his country's liberties for
British gold." Mobs burned Jay in effigy, and pelted Alexander Hamilton.
At a public meeting in Philadelphia, Mr. Blair threw the treaty to the
crowd, and advised them to kick it to hell. They carried it on a pole
in procession, and burned it before the English minister's house. A
Democratic society in Richmond, Virginia, full of the true modern South
Carolina "sound and fury," gave public notice, that, if the treaty
entered into by "that damned arch traitor, John Jay, with the British
tyrant should be ratified, a petition will be presented to the next
General Assembly of Virginia praying that the said State may recede
from the Union, and be left under the government and protection of
one hundred thousand free and independent Virginians!" A meeting at
Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, resolved, "that it was weary of the tardiness