did not in the least intermit their abuse of me, though receiving emoluments from the government, and that I have never thought it proper to interfere for myself, and consequently not in the case of the Vice-President.  That as to the letter he referred to, I remembered it, and believed he had only mistaken the date at which it was written; that I thought it must have been on the first notice of the event of the election of South Carolina; and that I had taken that occasion to mention to him, that I had intended to have proposed to him one of the great offices, if he had not been elected; but that his election, in giving him a higher station, had deprived me of his aid in the administration.  The letter alluded to was, in fact, mine to him of December the 15th, 1800.  I now went on to explain to him verbally, what I meant by saying I had lost him from my list.  That in General Washington’s time, it had been signified to him that Mr. Adams, the Vice-President, would be glad of a foreign embassy; that General Washington mentioned it to me, expressed his doubts whether Mr. Adams was a fit character for such an office, and his still greater doubts, indeed, his conviction, that it would not be justifiable to send away the person who, in case of his death, was provided by the constitution to take his place:  that it would moreover appear indecent for him to be disposing of the public trusts, in apparently buying off a competitor for the public favor.  I concurred with him in the opinion, and, if I recollect rightly, Hamilton, Knox, and Randolph were consulted, and gave the same opinions.  That when Mr. Adams came to the administration, in his first interview with me, he mentioned the necessity of a mission to France, and how desirable it would have been to him if he could have got me to undertake it; but that he conceived it would be wrong in him to send me away, and assigned the same reasons General Washington had done; and therefore, he should appoint Mr. Madison, &c.  That I had myself contemplated his (Colonel Burr’s) appointment to one of the great offices, in case he was not elected Vice-President; but that as soon as that election was known, I saw it could not be done, for the good reasons which had led General Washington and Mr. Adams to the same conclusion; and therefore, in my first letter to Colonel Burr, after the issue was known, I had mentioned to him that a chasm in my arrangements had been produced by this event.  I was thus particular in rectifying the date of this letter, because it gave me an opportunity of explaining the grounds on which it was written, which were, indirectly, an answer to his present hints.  He left the matter with me for consideration, and the conversation was turned to indifferent subjects.  I should here notice, that Colonel Burr must have thought I could swallow strong things in my own favor, when he founded his acquiescence to the nomination as Vice-President, to his desire of promoting my honor, the being with