[40] JERRY W. KNUDSON has remarked, "It was talent such as Paine's that had enabled the United States to be a nation and have ships!' Even Henry Adams applauded the "earnestness and courage" of the President's action, but the great-grandson of John Adams also noted, "Had Jefferson written a letter to Bonaparte applauding his 'useful labors' on the 18th Bru- maire, and praying that he might live long to continue them, he would not have excited in the minds of the New England Calvinists so deep a sense of disgust as by thus seeming to identify himself with Paine!'11 The first news of Jefferson's offer of a government ship for Tom Paine's return voyage appeared in the National Intelligencer and Washington Advertiser on July 15, 1801. The newspaper reprinted Jefferson's letter to Paine as it had appeared in the Paris press, probably placed there by Paine himself to publicize the honor.12 An almost immediate reaction was forthcoming from the Federalist kingpin of the Philadelphia press, the Gazette of the United States, which would not let this bit of news slip by without a slur on the Irish background of William Duane, rival Jeffersonian editor of the Philadelphia Aurora. General Advertiser: TOM PAINE AND PAT DUANE. When the story arrived here, that the President of the United States had written a very affectionate letter to that living opprobrium of humanity, TOM PAINE, the infamous scavenger of all the filth which could be raked from the dirty paths which have been hitherto trodden by all the revilers of Christianity, Duane, instead of attempting to refute this scandalous charge upon the President, admits that it may be true, and even endeavours to justify it.13 Still the leader of the Federalist press, the Gazette of the United States was by no means alone in its attack on Jefferson's invitation. The Mercury and New-England Palladium, pride and joy of the diehard Federalists of Boston, was even more vehement in its first reaction to the startling news: "What! Invite to the United States that lying, drunken, brutal infidel, who rejoiced in the opportunity of bask- 11 McMaster, A History of the People of the United States, II, 595, see also Gazette of the United States, July 27, 1801; Henry Adams, History of the United States of America during the First Administration of Thomas Jefferson (2 vols.; New York: 1889), 1,318, 317. 12 Aldridge, Man of Reason, 270. 13 Gazette of the United States, July 21,1801.