A year into his second term, President George Washington celebrated his 63rd birthday on February 22, 1794, and received one of the best birthday presents any head of state ever received. The new minister from France, Jean Antoine Joseph Baron Fauchet presented his credentials as the new ambassador from France, replacing the troublesome Edmund-Charles Genet at last. Citizen Genet was many things. A child prodigy, fluent in six languages by age twelve, he was born at Versailles in 1763, the only son of a French civil servant. Genet served as court translator in his youth and was then sent to...