1. In a letter to Timothy Pickering, 17 Dec. 1821, Wagner gave vent to his feelings about JM: “Mr. M. I always considered a profound master of dissimulation in public affairs. In his private character, I gratefuly attest to his urbanity and correctness of intercourse with his friends and all others. Mr. Jefferson, though equally dextrous in wearing borrowed appearances to further his political views, was less cautious, discreet and free from the impulse of his personal feelings, which often betrayed him. … In the course of six years intimacy and confidence, which I enjoyed with Mr. Madison, I never but once knew him to surprize himself into an indiscretion. This was in telling me, that Mr. Crawford, a Clerk in his office, must be discharged, because his father had voted for Mr. Adams as President. He was the only Clerk Mr. Madison ever dismissed; and to continue the episode, the whole Pennsylvania delegation, with one exception, called upon him to cashier me, but he not only refused—he used the delicacy never to mention the matter to me.

“I could multiply examples of his dissimulation in public affairs. You are well acquainted with those which are public. His whole administration as President is a tissue of it. Mr. Robert Smith’s publication is a record of it. The dismissal of the Minister Jackson for insulting language, which could not be found, when the real cause was an antecedent proscription by Bonaparte, for a real or supposed connection with Drake’s affair; the business of Turreau’s letter, which I obtained and published some years ago; and the proclamation, which on the ground of a pretended revocation by Bonaparte of his decrees, led to the war by absolving France from commercial restraints, without the merit of a compliance with the condition imposed by law; these transactions, when viewed in connection with their attendant circumstances, are pretty emphatic illustrations of a want of sincerity of the conspicuous statesman who was the author of them.

“Though all intercourse between us has ceased, it has not arisen from any injury or offence against me. For that, and a more characteristic reason, I wish not to appear before the world as his enemy, or accuser. In this understanding, I will mention one, among many of his crooked ways, which filled me with disgust, before I resolved to quit a station, which I constantly offered to leave open for another candidate. Dr. George Davis of New York had been Consul at Tunis, and was patronized by Colo. Burr. At a time when he was engaged in one of those boisterous but generally inconsequential disputes, which are so common in the regencies of Barbary, Commodore Rogers arrived, listened to the Bey, and without either authority or good policy removed Davis from Office and brought him home. At Washington, the conduct of the Consul was investigated and approved; and I was directed to tell him the decision, which had taken place, … it was not expedient to attempt to force him back into his former station, he would be provided with an equivalent office. This communication I made and he danced attendance upon me a length of time to know when the boon should be ready for him. Meanwhile Burr’s consequence decisively declined, and on entering the office one morning, Mr. Madison, after passing Davis in my apartment as he had often done before, he asked me, when we were alone, “what could that little fellow want? he hoped he did not expect to get an office.” I answered firmly, that he did, and with reason, as he had been promised one by me under his direction. With this decided stand he was stunned, as he expected to smother the matter with my acquiescence. It is a remarkable trifle, that whenever he affected uncommon contempt for an individual, though a small person himself, he did not fail to ascribe the epithet little fellow” (Frederick S. Allis Jr., ed., The Timothy Pickering Papers [MHi microfilm ed.; 69 reels; Boston, 1966], reel 31).