Mr.
Gallatin himself furnishes the apology that the difference might arise from "entries made or omitted on erroneous principles." To the Federal financiers the palliation was as offensive as the charge, and rankled long and sore.

If it were not possible, when Elliott made an examination, to arrive at the precise facts, it is certainly now a secret as secure from discovery as the lost sibylline leaves.
Mr.Gallatin stated the debt of the United States-- On January 1, 1801, at $80,161,207.60 On January 1, 1802, at 77,881,890.29 -- ------------- Reduction $2,279,317.31 This difference was the amount of principal paid during the year 1801, the result of the management of his predecessors.

On December 18, 1801, Mr.Gallatin entered upon an examination of the time in which the total debt might be discharged, and showed that, by the annual application of $7,300,000 to the principal and interest the debt would in eight years, _i.

e._ on January 1, 1810, be reduced (by the payment of $32,289,000 of the principal) to $45,592,739, and that the same annual sum of $7,300,000 would discharge the whole debt by the year 1817.

The revenues of the Union he found sufficient to defray all the current expenses.