Graham procured the authorities of Kentucky to take action similar to that adopted in Ohio. Burr, still ignorant of Jefferson's Proclamation, proceeded to Nashville, there to embark in the boats Jackson was building for him, to go on the last river voyage of his adventure.
Jackson, like Smith and Clay, had been made uneasy by the rumors of Burr's treasonable designs. He had written Governor Claiborne at New Orleans a letter of warning, particularly against Wilkinson, and not mentioning Burr by name.[882] When Burr arrived at the Tennessee Capital, Jackson, his manner now cold, demanded an explanation. Burr, "with his usual dignified courtesy, instantly complied."[883] It would seem that Jackson was satisfied by his reassurance, in spite of the President's Proclamation which reached Nashville three days before Burr's departure;[884] for not only did Jackson permit him to proceed, but, when the adventurer started down the Cumberland in two of the six boats which he had built on Burr's previous orders, consented that a nephew of his wife should make one of the ten or fifteen young men who accompanied the expedition. He even gave the boy a letter of introduction to Governor Claiborne at New Orleans.[885]
After the people had recovered from the shock of astonishment that Jefferson's Proclamation gave them, the change in them was instantaneous and extreme.[886] The President, to be sure, had not mentioned Burr's name or so much as hinted at treason; all that Jefferson charged was a conspiracy to attack the hated Spaniards, and this was the hope and desire of every Westerner. Nevertheless, the public intelligence penetrated what it believed to be the terrible meaning behind the President's cautious words; the atrocious purpose to dismember the Union, reports of which had pursued Burr since a Spanish agent had first set the rumor afoot a year before, was established in the minds of the people.
Surely the President would not hunt down an American seeking to overthrow Spanish power in North America, when a Spanish "liberator" had been permitted to fit out in the United States an expedition to do the same thing in South America. Surely Jefferson would not visit his wrath on one whose only crime was the gathering of men to strike at Spain with which power, up to that very moment, everybody supposed war to be impending and, indeed, almost begun. This was unthinkable. Burr must be guilty of a greater crime—the greatest of crimes. In such fashion was public opinion made ready to demand the execution of the "traitor" who had so outrageously deceived the people; and that popular outcry began for the blood of Aaron Burr by which John Marshall was assailed while presiding over the court to which the accused was finally taken.
From the moment that Wilkinson decided to denounce Burr to the President, his language became that of a Bombastes Furioso, his actions those of a military ruffian, his secret movements matched the cunning of a bribe-taking criminal. By swiftest dispatch another message was sent to Jefferson. "My doubts have ceased," wrote Wilkinson, concerning "this deep, dark, wicked, and wide-spread conspiracy, embracing the young and the old, the democrat and the federalist, the native and the foreigner, the patriot of '76 and the exotic of yesterday, the opulent and the needy, the ins and the outs."
Wilkinson assured Jefferson, however, that he would meet the awful emergency with "indefatigable industry, incessant vigilance and hardy courage"; indeed, declared he, "I shall glory to give my life" to defeat the devilish plot. But the numbers of the desperadoes were so great that, unless Jefferson heavily reinforced him with men and ships, he and the American army under his command would probably perish.[887]
As the horse bearing the messenger to Jefferson disappeared in the forests, another, upon which rode a very different agent, left Wilkinson's camp and galloped toward the Southwest. The latter agent was Walter Burling, a corrupt factotum of Wilkinson's, whom that martial patriot sent to the Spanish Viceroy at Mexico City to advise him of Wilkinson's latest service to Spain in thwarting Burr's attack upon the royal possessions, and in averting war between the United States and His Catholic Majesty. For these noble performances Wilkinson demanded of the Spanish Viceroy more than one hundred and ten thousand dollars in cash, together with other sums which "he [had] been obliged to spend in order to sustain the cause of good government, order and humanity."[888]
Wilkinson had asked the Viceroy to destroy the letter and this was accordingly done in Burling's presence. The Royal representative then told Burling that he knew all about Burr's plans to invade Mexico, and had long been ready to repel a much larger force than Wilkinson stated Burr to be leading. "I thanked him for his martial zeal and insinuated that I wished him happiness in the pursuit of his righteous intentions," wrote the disgusted and sarcastic Viceroy in his report to the Government at Madrid.[889] With this Wilkinson had to be content, for the Viceroy refused to pay him a peso.
Upon Burling's return, the vigilant American Commander-in-Chief forwarded to Jefferson a report of conditions in Mexico, as represented by Burling, together with a request for fifteen hundred dollars to pay that investigator's expenses.[890] The sole object of Burling's journey was, Wilkinson informed the President, to observe and report upon the situation in the great Spanish Vice-royalty as recent events had affected it, with respect to the interests of the United States; and Jefferson was assured by the General that his agent was the soundest and most devoted of patriots.[891]
To back up the character he was now playing, Wilkinson showered warnings upon the officers of the Army and upon government officials in New Orleans. "The plot thickens.... My God! what a situation has our country reached. Let us save it if we can.... On the 15th of this month [November], Burr's declaration is to be made in Tennessee and Kentucky; hurry, hurry after me, and, if necessary, let us be buried together, in the ruins of the place we shall defend." This was a typical message to Colonel Cushing.[892]