33 The Winning of the West 



assume, under British protection, in return for the 

 assistance of the British fleet in taking New Orleans. 

 He gave to the British ministers full and false 

 accounts of the intended uprising, and besought the 

 aid of the British Government on the ground that 

 the secession of the West would so cripple the Union 

 as to make it no longer a formidable enemy of Great 

 Britain. Burr's audacity and plausibility were such 

 that he quite dazzled the British minister, who de- 

 tailed the plans at length to his home government, 

 putting them in as favorable a light as he could. 

 The statesmen at London, however, although at 

 this time almost inconceivably stupid in their deal- 

 ings with America, were not sunk in such abject- 

 folly as to think Burr's schemes practicable, and they 

 refused to have anything to do with them. 



In April, 1805, Burr started on his tour to the 

 West. One of his first stoppages was at an island 

 on the Ohio near Parkersburg, where an Irish gen- 

 tleman named Blennerhassett had built what was, 

 for the West, an unusually fine house. Only Mrs. 

 Blennerhassett was at home at the time; but Blen- 

 nerhassett later became a mainstay of the "conspir- 

 acy." He was a warm-hearted man, with no judg- 

 ment and a natural tendency toward sedition, who 

 speedily fell under Burr's influence, and entered into 

 his plans with eager zeal. With him Burr did not 

 have to be on his guard, and to him he confided 

 freely his plans ; but elsewhere, and in dealing with 

 less emotional people, he had to be more guarded. 



It is always difficult to find out exactly what a 



