versal. It was the king who persuaded his minister to forego the opportunity which never could recur, and against his own conviction, without opening to America any hope of pacification, to adjourn the parliament to the twentieth of January. Those who were near Lord North in his old age never heard him murmur at his having become blind; "but in the solitude of sleepless nights he would sometimes fall into very low spirits, and deeply reproach himself for having at the earnest desire of the king remained in administration after he thought that peace ought to have been made with America."

The account of Burgoyne's surrender, which was 1777. brought to France by a swift-sailing ship from Boston, threw Turgot and all Paris into transports of joy. None doubted the ability of the states to maintain their independence. On the twelfth of December, their commissioners had an interview with Vergennes. "Nothing," said he,

"has struck me so much as General Washington's attacking and giving battle to General Howe's army. To bring troops raised within the year to this, promises every thing. The court of France, in the treaty which is to be entered into, intend to take no advantage of your present situation. Once made, it should be durable; and therefore it should contain no condition of which the Americans may afterwards repent, but such only as will last as long as human institutions shall endure, so that mutual amity may subsist for ever. Entering into a treaty will be an avowal of your independence. Spain must be consulted, and Spain will not be satisfied with an undetermined boundary on the west. Some of the states are supposed to run to the South Sea, which might interfere with her claim to California." It was answered that the last treaty of peace adopted the Mississippi as a boundary. "And what share do you intend to give us in the fisheries?" said Vergennes; for in the original draft of a treaty the United States had proposed to take to themselves Cape Breton and the whole of the island of Newfoundland. Explanations were made by the American commissioners that their later instructions removed all chances of disagreement on that subject.

The return of the courier to Spain was not waited for. On the seventeenth, Gerard, one of the secretaries of Vergennes, informed Franklin and Deane, by the king's order, that the king in council had determined not only to acknowledge the United States, but to support their cause; and, perhaps exceeding his authority, he added, in case England should declare war on France on account of this recognition, he would not insist that the Americans should not make a separate peace, but only that they should maintain their independence. The American commissioners answered: "We perceive and admire the king's magnanimity and wisdom. He will find us faithful and firm allies. We wish with his majesty that the amity between the two nations may last for ever;" and both parties agreed that good relations could continue between a monarchy and a republic, between a Catholic monarchy and a Protestant republic. The French king promised in January three millions of livres ; as much more, it was said, would be remitted by Spain from Havana. The vessels laden with supplies for the United States should be convoyed by a king's ship out of the channel. But the Spanish government, which wished to avoid a rupture with England, took alarm, and receded from its intention.

Jan.

In January, 1778, Lord Amherst, as military ad- 1778. viser, gave the opinion that nothing less than an additional army of forty thousand men would be sufficient to carry on offensive war in North America; but the king would not suffer Lord North to flinch, writing sometimes chidingly that there could not be "a man either bold or mad enough to presume to treat for the mother country on a basis of independence;" sometimes appealing to the minister's "personal affection for him and sense of honor;" and, in the event of a war with France, suggesting that "it might be wise to draw the troops from the revolted provinces, and to make war on the French and Spanish islands." To Lord Chatham might be offered any thing but substantial power, for "his name, which was always his greatest merit, would hurt Lord Rockingham's party." court the king lavished civilities on George Grenville and others who were connected with Lord Chatham.

1778. Feb.

Correct reports from Versailles reached Leopold of Tuscany and Joseph of Austria. "The women," so predicted the latter to his brother before the end of January, "the women and the enthusiasm of the moment, making the ministers afraid of losing their places, will determine them for making war on the English; and they could commit no greater folly." While "the two greatest countries in Europe were fairly running a race for the favor of the Americans, the question of a French alliance with them was discussed by Vergennes with the Marquis D'Ossun as the best adviser with regard to Spain, and the plan of action was digested by them. Then these two met the king at the apartment of Maurepas, who was ill with the gout; and there the whole subject was debated and finally settled. Maurepas, at heart opposed to the war, loved his ease, and loved popularity too well to escape the sway of external opinion; and Louis XVI. sacrificed his own inclination and his own feeling of justice to policy of state and the opinion of his advisers. So, on the sixth of February, a treaty of amity and commerce, and also an eventual defensive treaty of alliance, was concluded between the king of France and the United States. They were founded on principles of equality and reciprocity, and for the most part were in conformity to the proposals of congress. In commerce each party was to be placed on the footing of the most favored nation. The king of France promised his good offices with the princes and powers of Barbary. As to the fisheries, each party reserved to itself the exclusive possession of its own. Accepting the French interpretation of the treaties of Utrecht and of Paris, the United States acknowledged the right of French subjects to fish on the banks of Newfoundland, and their exclusive right to half the coast of that island for drying-places. On the question of ownership in the event of the conquest of Newfoundland, the treaty was silent. The American proposal, that free ships give freedom to goods and to persons except to soldiers in actual service of an enemy, was adopted. Careful lists were made out of contraband merchandises, and of those not contraband. The absolute and unlimited

1778.

independence of the United States was described as the essential end of the defensive alliance; and the two parties mutually engaged not to lay down their arms until it should be assured by the treaties terminating the war. Moreover, the United States guaranteed to France the possessions then held by France in America, as well as Feb. those which it might acquire by a future treaty of peace; and, in like manner, the king of France guaranteed to the United States their present possessions, and their acquisitions during the war from the dominions of Great Britain in North America. A separate and secret act reserved to the king of Spain the power of acceding to the treaties.

Within forty-two hours of the signature of these treaties of commerce and alliance, the ministry received the news by a special messenger from their spy in Paris; but it was not divulged; the floating rumors which crossed the channel could not arrest the senseless bickerings of parties, or the favorite amusement of badgering the friends of Rockingham about the declaratory act. On the eleventh, Hillsborough called out to the Duke of Richmond: "In what manner does he mean that England shall crouch to the vipers and rebels in America? By giving up the sacred right of taxation? or by yielding to America with respect to her absurd pretensions about her charters? or by declaring the thirteen provinces independent?" Richmond answered: "I never liked the declaratory act; I voted for it with regret to obtain the repeal of the stamp act; I wish we could have done without it; I looked upon it as a piece of waste paper that no minister would ever have the madness to revive; I will, with pleasure, be the first to repeal it, or to give it up." In this mood Richmond sought harmony with Chatham. On the same day, in the house of commons, young George Grenville attacked the administration in the harshest terms, and pointed out Lord Chatham as the proper person to treat with America. The very sincere and glowing words of eulogy spoken by the son of the author of the stamp-tax were pleasing to Lord Chatham in these his last days.

While the British government stumbled in the dark,

Franklin placed the public opinion of philosophical France conspicuously on the side of America. No man of that century so imbodied the idea of toleration as Voltaire; for fame he was unequalled among living men of letters; for great age he was venerable; he, more than Louis XVI., more than the cabinet of the king, represented France of that day; and now he was come up to Paris, bent with years, to receive before his death the homage of its people. Wide indeed was the difference between him and America. "I have done more in my day than Luther or Calvin,” was his boast; and America, which was reverently Protestant, and through Protestantism established not the toleration, but the equality of all churches and opinions, did not count him among her teachers. He had given out that, if there was not a God, it would be necessary to invent him; while America held that any god of man's invention is an idol; that God must be worshipped in truth as well as in spirit. But for the moment America and Voltaire were on one side; and, before he had been a week in Paris, Franklin claimed leave to wait upon him. We have Voltaire's account of the interview. Franklin bade his grandson demand the benediction of the more than octogenarian, and in the presence of twenty persons he gave it in these words: “GOD AND LIBERTY!" Everywhere Voltaire appeared as the friend of America. Being in company where the young wife of Lafayette was present, he asked that she might be brought to him, kissed her hand, and spoke to her the praises of her husband and of the cause which he served.

1778.

Feb.

Almost simultaneously, Lord North, on the seventeenth of February, made known to the house of commons the extent of his conciliatory propositions. Of the two bills, one declared the intention of the parliament of Great Britain not to exercise the right of imposing taxes within the colonies of North America, the other authorized commissioners to be sent to the United States. In a speech of two hours, Lord North avowed that he had never had a policy of his own. He had never proposed any tax on America; he had found the tea-tax imposed, and, while he declined to repeal