they might be deceived in this confident expectation, that would not alter in one tittle their course of action. Their duty would be the same, and the same would be their determination to fulfill it. They would prepare themselves with apprehension, indeed, but without dismay; with regret, but with firmness; for one of those desperate struggles which have sometimes occurred in the history of the world, but where a just cause and the favor of Providence have given strength to comparative weakness, and enabled it to break down the pride of power.

"But I have already said that the United States do not fear that any such united attempt will be made upon their independence. What, however, they may reasonably fear, and what they do fear, is, that in the execution of this treaty, measures will be taken which they must resist. How far the act of one of the parties putting its construction upon its own duties, and upon the obligations of its co-contractors, may involve these in any unlookedfor consequences, either by the adoption of similar measures, or by their rejection, I do not presume to judge. Certain it is, however, that if the fact, and the principle advanced by Lord Aberdeen, are correct, that these treaties for the abolition of the slave trade can not be executed without forcibly boarding American ships at sea in time of peace, and that the obligations created by them confer not only the right thus to violate the American flag, but make this measure a duty, then it is also the duty of France to pursue the same course. Should she put this construction upon her obligations, it is obvious the United States must do to her as they will do to England, if she persist in this attack upon their independence. Should she not, it does not become me to investigate the nature of her position with respect to one of her associates, whose opinion respecting their relative duties would be so widely different from her own. But I may express the hope that the government of his Majesty, before ratifying this treaty, will examine maturely the pretensions asserted by one of the parties, and see how these can be reconciled, not only with the honor and interest of the United States, but with the received principles of the great maritime code of nations. I may make this appeal with the more confidence, from the relations subsisting between France and the United States, from a community of interest in the liberty of the seas, from a community of opinion respecting the principles

which guard it, and from a community in danger, should it ever be menaced by the ambition of any maritime power.

"It appears to me, sir, that, in asking the attention of his Majesty's government to the subject of the quintuple treaty, with a view to its reconsideration, I am requesting nothing, on the part of the United States, inconsistent with the duties of France to other powers. If, during the course of the discussion upon this treaty, preparatory to the arrangement of its provisions, England had asserted to the other parties the pretension she now asserts to the United States, as a necessary consequence of its obligations, I can not be wrong in presuming that France would not have signed it without guarding against this impending difficulty. The views of England are now disclosed to you, but, fortunately, before its ratification. And this change of circumstance may well justify the French government in interposing such a remedy as it may think is demanded by the grave interest involved in this question.. "As to the treaties of 1831 and 1833, between France and Great Britain, for the suppression of the slave trade, I do not consider it my duty to advert to their stipulations. Their obligations upon the contracting parties, whatever these may be, are now complete; and it is for my government alone to determine what measures the United States ought to take to avert the consequences with which they are now threatened, by the construction which one of the parties has given to these instruments.

"I have the honor to transmit, herewith, a copy of the message of the President of the United States to Congress, in December last, and of the annual documents which accompanied it. Among the latter will be found the correspondence between the British Secretaries of State and Mr. Stevenson, upon the subject herein referred to. From these you will learn the respective views of the American and British governments.

"It is proper for me to add, that this communication has been made without any instruction from the United States. I have considered this case as one in which an American representative to a foreign power should act, without awaiting the orders of his government. I have presumed, in the views I have submitted to you, that I express the feelings of the American government and people. If, in this, I have deceived myself, the responsibility will be mine. As soon as I can receive dispatches from the United

States, in answer to my communications, I shall be enabled to declare to you either that my conduct has been approved by the President, or that my mission is terminated.

"I avail myself, &c.,

"LEWIS CASS.

"His Excellency M. GUIZOT,

"Minister of Foreign Affairs."

CHAPTER XXVIII.

Disappointment of England-The Washington Treaty-General Cass resigns his Mission-The Correspondence-England's Construction of the Treaty.

The British government, having failed to secure the approval of its scheme by the Chamber of Deputies, was anxious to retreat with some appearance of honor; and disdaining to appear before the world as entirely unsuccessful in her project, coupled with the wish to impress the other great powers with her sincerity and laudable motives in suggesting the quintuple treaty, sought an opportunity to open a negotiation relative to the slave trade with the United States. With this view, Lord Ashburton was sent as a special ambassador to Washington, clad with authority to adjust and definitely settle all matters of difference between the two countries.

The negotiation was opened between his lordship and Mr. Webster, the Secretary of State, and a treaty concluded. Mr. Webster, in communicating this treaty to General Cass, in France, called his attention particularly to the clauses relating to the suppression of the African slave trade. The provisions of the treaty, in relation to this branch of the negotiation, did not meet with the views of General Cass. He considered the omission to procure a renunciation of the offensive claim of England to the right of search, while engaged on this very subject, placed him in a false position, and rendered his situation, as Minister to France, unpleasant.

With powers of mind which grasp, as it were, by intuition, every subject to which they are applied, united to various and extensive acquirements, he had exposed the mischief that lurked in the quintuple treaty; he had shown that the whole eastern coast of America, south of the thirty-second degree of north latitude, came within its gigantic sweep. No vessel of the contracting parties could ever have been approaching New York, Boston, Philadelphia, or Charleston, with a cargo from any part of the world, south of Savannah, without risk of being searched for slaves by British. cruisers, the voyage stopped, and the vessel ordered to some British

Court of Admiralty for adjudication. Almost beyond credibility, yet the words of the treaty prove it. The space for British search comprehended more than seventy degrees of latitude. Nay; it might have been exercised upon all the vessels going to or from New Orleans, in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. What a blow to commercial pursuits was happily warded off by the bold and unprecedented movement of General Cass! He, by the stroke of his pen, as it were, foreclosed British supremacy on the high seas, and barred the door against her fanaticism there, that she might do her work more thoroughly and quickly on the land. He thus exposed himself to the wildest anti-slavery fanaticism of England, in the enlightened and fearless vindication of the rights of his country, and was showered with calumnies by the tory press of Britain and defamatory peers in Parliament. Lord Brougham was mad with rage at the defeat of this portentous treaty by the talents, sagacity, and patriotism of General Cass. He thundered from the tory benches, and exhausted the vocabularies of Johnson and Walker. And notwithstanding the American Minister had thus successfully performed his duty as an American Minister should have done, and that, too, without feeling, at the time, that any very especial credit was due to his patriotism, and was thus exposed to the growl and roar of the British lion, still, it turned out, in the sequel, that he was not to escape indignity and injustice from his own government, in the person of Daniel Webster, the Secretary of State. The proof is on record, or we might want faith in such a charge. It is contained in the correspondence between Mr. Webster and himself, transpiring after his return from France; but never was retribution sooner brought about, as far as the parties were concerned, and his own victory over Mr. Webster was complete. No two judgments can differ about this. The necessity that created this correspondence was the more painful to General Cass, because they were classmates in youth at Exeter, and always retaining for each other sentiments of respect and friendship; indeed, each wishing for the other a prosperous voyage through life. Years afterwards, in personal intercourse, General Cass, from soine remarks made by Mr. Webster, was led to doubt whether the latter did not, in all this matter, act from the promptings of others. Suffice it to say, that cordial intimacy between them was re-established, and continued unbroken to the day of Mr. W.'s death; and the eulogy pronounced by General