ture consideration, no reasonable doubt can be entertained that the latter course should have been pursued. It will be recollected that the standing reason urged by Great Britain, against yielding the principle that our flag should protect the crew was, that she was struggling against the power of revolutionary France for her existence, and depended on her navy for her safety; and that under such circumstances she could not admit the force of mere abstract principles-self-preservation being with her the highest object of consideration. There certainly was much force in this objection on her part, to treating on that specific point, at that critical period. That Mr. Jefferson should feel differently from the British statesmen, was perfectly natural. It has been shown that his governing principle in politics was, animosity against Great Britain, and attachment to France. It was well known, that from the strong national resemblance between Britons and Americans, and particularly from the identity of language, great difficulty would exist in distinguishing between American citizens and British subjects; and this was one argument strongly urged against negotiation on this subject. But a clue to Mr. Jefferson's feelings towards that nation, may be discovered in his works published since his death, beyond the passages already quoted. The following is a letter to William B. Giles :

Monticello, April 27, 1795. 5. DEAR SIR,-Your favour of the 16th came to hand by the last post. I sincerely congratulate you on the great prosperity of our two first allies, the French and the Dutch. If I could but see them now at peace with the rest of their continent, I should have but little doubt of dining with Pichegru in London next autumn; for I believe I should be tempted to leave my clover for awhile, to go and hail the dawn of liberty and republicanism in that island.”

This is the language of Mr. Jefferson, when writing to What must have an intimate and confidential friend.

been the principles and the heart of the man, who, from mere political feelings and resentments, could talk with such an air of levity, on such a subject? Wishing to dine with Pichegru in London, necessarily implied a wish that he might, as well as a belief that he would, be able to invade, overrun, and conquer Great Britain. That is, because the people of that nation preferred the government under which they lived, and which had been the means of elevating their country to a far greater height of freedom, prosperity, power, and renown, than any other European nation ever enjoyed, to Mr. Jefferson's notions of republicanism, he would have subjected them to all the miseries and horrors of an invading and victorious army, and to the tremendous consequences which must necessarily follow such a state of things, in such a country. Fortunately for Europe, and the interests of the civilized world, he was disappointed of the pleasure to be derived from such a festive entertainment. The French were not able to conquer Great Britain, and of course Pichegru had no opportunity of inviting his republican friends in other parts of the world to dine with him in London, and to heighten the hilarity of the entertainment, by witnessing the pillage and butcheries which must have attended a conquest over such a city.

Mr. Monroe, after the conclusion of the treaty, returned to the United States. As might have been expected, he considered himself as having been harshly dealt with in relation to it. On the 10th of March, 1808, Mr. Jefferson wrote to him on that subject. Among other things he

says

"You complain of the manner in which the treaty was received. But what was that manner? I cannot suppose you to have given a moment's credit to the stuff which was crowded in all sorts of forms into the public papers, or to

the thousand speeches they put into my mouth, not a word of which I had ever uttered. I was not insensible at the time of the views to mischief, with which these lies were fabricated. But my confidence was firm, that neither yourself nor the British government, equally outraged by them, would believe me capable of making the editors of newspapers the confidants of my speeches or opinions. The fact was this. The treaty was communicated to us by Mr. Erskine on the day Congress was to rise. Two of the senators inquired of me in the evening, whether it was my purpose to detain them on account of the treaty. My answer was, 'that it was not; that the treaty containing no provision against the impressment of our seamen, and being accompanied by a kind of protestation of the British ministers, which would leave that government free to consider it as a treaty or no treaty, according to their own convenience, I should not give them the trouble of deliberating on it.' This was substantially, and almost verbally what I said whenever spoken to about it, and I never failed when the occasion would admit of it, to justify yourself and Mr. Pinkney, by expressing my conviction, that it was all that could be obtained from the British vernment; that you had told their commissioners that your government could not be pledged to ratify, because it was contrary to their instructions; of course, that it should be considered but as a project; and in this light I stated it publicly in my message to congress on the opening of the session."

go

Some time after his return, Mr. Monroe addressed a letter to Mr. Madison, giving a detailed account of the difficulties which the commissioners met with in the negotiations, the light in which he viewed various provisions in the treaty, and the sentiments which he entertained of its general character. That letter was dated at Richmond, Virginia, February 23, 1808. The following are extracts from it

"The impressment of seamen from our merchant vessels is a topic which claims a primary attention, from the order which it holds in your letter, but more especially from some important considerations that are connected with it. The idea entertained by the public is, that the rights of the United States were abandoned by the American commissioners in the late negotiation, and that their seamen were left by tacit acquiescence, if not by formal renunciation, to depend, for their safety, on the mercy of the British cruisers. I have, on the contrary, always believed, and still do believe, that the ground on which that interest was placed by the paper of the British commissioners of November 8, 1806, and the explanations which accompanied it, was both honourable and advantageous to the United States; that it contained a concession in their favour, on the part of Great Britain, on the great principle in contestation, never before made by a formal and obligatory act of the government, which was highly favourable to their interest; and that it also imposed on her the obligation to conform her practice under it, till a more complete arrangement should be concluded, to the just claims of the United States." "The British paper states that the king was not prepared to disclaim or derogate from a right on which the security of the British navy might essentially depend, especially in a conjuncture when he was engaged in wars which enforced the necessity of the most vigilant attention to the preservation and supply of his naval force; that he had directed his commissioners to give to the commissioners of the United States the most positive assurances that instructions had been given, and should be repeated and enforced, to observe the greatest caution in the impressing of British seamen, to preserve the citizens of the United States from molestation or injury, and that immediate and prompt redress should be afforded on any representation of injury sustained by them. It then proposes to postpone the article relative to

impressment on account of the difficulties which were experienced in arranging any article on that subject, and to proceed to conclude a treaty on the other points that were embraced by the negotiation. As a motive to such postponement, and the condition of it, it assures us that the British commissioners were instructed still to entertain the discussion of any plan which could be devised to secure the interests of both states without injury to the rights of either.

"By this paper, it is evident that the rights of the United States were expressly to be reserved, and not abandoned, as has been most erroneously supposed; that the negotiation on the subject of impressment was to be postponed for a limited time, and for a special object only, and to be revived as soon as that object was accomplished; and, in the interim, that the practice of impressment was to correspond essentially with the views and interests of the United States. It is, indeed, evident, from a correct view of the contents of that paper, that Great Britain refused to disclaim or derogate only from what she called her right, as it also is, that as her refusal was made applicable to a crisis of extraordinary peril, it authorized the reasonable expectation, if not the just claim, that even in that the accommodation desired would be hereafter yielded.

"In our letter to you of November 11, which accompanied the paper under consideration, and in that of January 3, which was forwarded with the treaty, these sentiments were fully confirmed. In that of November 11, we communicated one important fact, which left no doubt of the sense in which it was intended by the British commissioners that that paper should be construed by us. In calling your attention to the passage which treats of impressment, in reference to the practice which should be observed in future, we remarked that the terms " high seas" were not mentioned in it, and added that we knew that the omission had been intentional. It was impossible