with the same success. This city would not furnish troops; it consented only to give the same sum as London. The ministers experienced still more difficulties in the country; the landholders being grown sulky at the weight of their assessments, and at having been deceived by promises that the American taxes were to be in diminution of their own. Upon the whole, this project of voluntary levies, and gratuitous contributions, though not absolutely fruitless, was still very far from affording the resources which had been counted upon. It however became the subject of violent declamations in parliament; but with the usual event; the ministry triumphed.

While such was the procedure of the English government, in order to sustain the struggle in which it was engaged, the Congress urged with new fervor the negotiations which they had already, a long time back, set on foot with the court of France. The American commissioners had left nothing unessayed that could decide it to declare openly in their favor; but however pressing were their solicitations with the French ministers to induce them to take a definitive resolution, they had not as yet obtained any thing but evasive and dilatory answers. In this first period of the American revolution, considering the uncertainty of its issue, France hesitated to espouse the quarrel of a people whose force appeared insufficient to sustain the pressure of so perilous an enterprise. She feared lest the colonists might all at once desist, and resume all their ancient relations with England. Those who directed the counsels of France were not ignorant, that at the very moment in which she should declare herself, the British ministry, by acquiescing in the concessions demanded by the Americans, might instantly disarm them, and that France would then find herself alone saddled with a war, without motive, and without object.

To this consideration was added, that before coming to an open rupture with Great Britain, it was essential to restore order in the finances, and to reestablish the marine, both having suffered excessively from the disorder, disasters and prodigality of the preceding reign. The declaration of independence, it is true, had removed the danger of a sudden reconciliation; but it was still possible to doubt the success of resistance. Nor should we omit to say, that, though France would rather see America independent, than reconciled with England, she relished the prospect of a long war between them, still better than independence. Perhaps, even, she would have liked best of all a conquest by dint of arms, and the consequent subjugation; for, upon this hypothesis, the English colonies, ravaged and ruined, would have ceased to enrich the mother country, by the benefits of their commerce in time of peace; and in time of war, the English would no longer have found in their colonists those powerful auxiliaries, who so often had succoured them with so much efficacy. Should the colonies, though vanquished, preserve their ancient

prosperity, then England would be constrained to maintain in them a part of her force, in order to prevent the revolts she would have continually to dread on the part of a people impressed with the recollection of so many outrages and cruelties.

But upon the second hypothesis, or that of independence, it was impossible to dissemble that the example would be pernicious for the colonies of the other European powers, and that the smallest of the probable inconveniences, would be the necessity of granting them, to the great prejudice of the mother country, a full and entire liberty of commerce. These considerations, carefully weighed by the French ministers, so wrought, that repressing their ardor for war, they covered their projects with an impenetrable veil, and drew the negotiation into length. They restricted themselves to expressions of benevolence toward the Americans, and to granting them clandestinely the succours we have spoken of in another place. And even those succours were furnished with more or less mystery, more or less liberality, as fortune showed herself propitious or adverse to the American arms. Such was the rigor with which France adhered, or appeared to adhere, to this wary policy, either with a view of not breaking before the time with England, or in order the more effectually to place the Americans at her discretion, and constrain them to subscribe to all her demands, that when the news arrived at Paris of the capture of Ticonderoga, and of the victorious march of Burgoyne towards Albany, events which seemed to decide in favor of the English, instructions were immediately despatched to Nantz, and the other ports of the kingdom, that no American privateers should be suffered to enter them, except from indispensable necessity, as to repair their vessels, to obtain provisions, or to escape the perils of the sea. Thus France, pursuing invariably the route prescribed by reason of state, which admirably suited her convenience, on the one hand amused the British ministers with protestations of friendship, and on the other encouraged the Americans with secret succours, by the uncertainty and scantiness of them, inflaming their ardor, and confirming their resolution by continual promises of future cooperation. Unshackled in her movements, she thus pledged herself to no party, but tranquilly waited to see what course things would take. The agents of Congress did not fail, however, to urge and besiege the cabinet of Versailles to come at length to a final decision. But the French ministers, with many tosses and shrugs, alleged a variety of excuses in support of their system of procrastination, at one time, that the fleet expected from Newfoundland, crowded with excellent seamen, was not yet arrived; at another, that the galleons of Spain were still at sea, and now some other subterfuge was invented. Thus alternately advancing and receding, never allowing their intentions to be fathomed, they kept the Americans in continual uncertainty. Finally, the commissioners, out of all

patience, and determined, if practicable, without waiting longer, to extricate themselves from this labyrinth, imagined an expedient for reducing the French ministers themselves to the necessity of dropping the vizor; this was to suggest, that if France did not assist them immediately, the Americans could defer no longer a voluntary or compulsory arrangement with England.

To this effect, they waited upon the ministers about the middle of August, 1777, with a memorial in which they represented, that if France supposed that the war could be continued for any considerable time longer without her interference she was much mistaken. 'Indeed,' continued the memorial, the British government have every thing to lose and nothing to gain, by continuing the war. After the present campaign, they will therefore doubtless make it their great and last effort to recover the dominion of America, and terminate the war. They probably hope that a few victories may, by the chance of war, be obtained; and that these on one hand, and the wants and distresses of the colonists on the other, may induce them to return again to a dependence, more or less limited, on Great Britain. They must be sensible, that if ever America is to be conquered by them, it must be within the present year; that if it be impossible to do it in this year of the dispute, it will be madness to expect more success afterwards, when the difficulties of the Americans' former situation are removed; when their new independent governments have acquired stability; and when the people are become, as they soon will be, well armed, disciplined and supplied with all the means of resistance.

The British ministry must therefore be sensible, that a continuation of hostilities against the colonies, after this year, can only tend to prolong the danger, or invite an additional war in Europe; and they therefore doubtless intend, after having tried the success of this campaign, however it may end, to make peace on the best terms which can be obtained. And if they cannot recover the colonies as subjects, to admit their claim of independency, and secure them by a federal alliance. Therefore no means are left for France to prevent the colonists from being shortly reconciled to Great Britain, either as subjects or allies, but to enter immediately into such engagements with them as will necessarily preclude all others; such as will permanently bind and secure their commerce and friendship, and enable them as well to repel the attacks, as to spurn at the offers of their present enemy.

'France must remember,' it was added, that the first resistance of the colonists was not to obtain independency, but a redress of their grievances; and that there are many among them who might even now be satisfied with a limited subjection to the British crown. A majority has indeed put in for the prize of independency; they have done it on a confidence that France, attentive to her most important

interests, would soon give them open and effectual support. But when they find themselves disappointed; when they see some of the powers of Europe furnish troops to assist in their subjugation; another power, alluding to Portugal, proscribing their commerce; and the rest looking on, as indifferent spectators; it is very probable that, despairing of foreign aid, and severely pressed by their enemies and their own internal wants and distresses, they may be inclined to accept of such terms as it will be the interest of the British government to grant thern. Lord George Germain, but a few weeks since, declared in the house of commons that his hope of ending the American war this year, was principally founded on the disappointment which the colonists would feel, when they discover that no assistance is likely to be given them from France. The British adherents in America will spare no pains to spread and increase that disappointment, by discouraging representations; they already intimate that France, equally hostile to both parties, foments the present war, only to make them mutually instrumental in each others destruction.

Should Great Britain, by these and other means, detach the colonies, and reunite them to herself, France will irrecoverably lose the most favorable opportunity ever offered to any nation, of humbling a powerful, arrogant, and hereditary enemy.

But it is not simply the opportunity of reducing Great Britain, which France will lose by her present inactivity; for her own safety, and that of all her American possessions, will be endangered the moment in which a reconciliation takes place between Britain and America. The king and ministry of Great Britain know and feel that France has encouraged and assisted the colonists in their present resistance; and they are as much incensed against her, as they would be, were she openly to declare war. In truth, France has done too much, unless she intends to do more.

Can any one doubt but that whenever peace with America is obtained by Great Britain, whatever may be the conditions of it, the whole British force now on the continent of America, will be suddenly transported to the West Indies, and employed in subduing the French sugar islands there, to recompense the losses and expenses which Great Britain has suffered and incurred in this war, and to revenge the insult and injury France has done her, by the encouragement and assistance which she is supposed to have secretly given the colonists against Great Britain ?

Such was the purport of the memorial presented to the French government, in order to terminate its hesitations; but this also was without success. The ministers were no less ingenious in discovering new evasions; they chose to wait to see the progress of this war. The news of the taking of Ticonderoga, and the fear of still more decisive operations on the part of general Howe, maintained their

doubts and indecision. They were loath to have no other part to play than extending the hand to insurgents, when already their wreck appeared inevitable. We venture not to say, that in this occurrence was again verified the vulgar maxim; the unfortunate have no friends; but it appeared, at least, that the cabinet of Versailles was determined to procrastinate until the distress of the Americans was arrived at such a point as to become their only law; that it might obtain from them the better conditions for France. Besides, as at this time there was much appearance that the British arms would carry all before them, an accommodation between the mother country and the colonies, seemed less probable than ever; and this was what the French government had feared the most. The ministers of England supposing them victorious in America, would have listened to no conditions short of an absolute submission; and the French appeared to desire this extremity even more than independence, provided only, that it was introduced by a long and desolating war.

Disgusted by so many delays, the American commissioners no longer entertained any doubt as to the secret policy which guided the French in this conjuncture. In their despair, they had well nigh broken off all negotiation with a government that reputed their misfortunes a source of prosperity to itself. Unable, therefore, to accomplish their views with France, and discerning no other prospect of safety, the Americans again addressed themselves to England, proposing to her the recognition of their independence. This point conceded, they would have yielded in all others, to such conditions as should most tend to save the honor of the mother country. They represented, that if the British ministry knew how to profit of the occasion, it depended on themselves to stipulate an arrangement so conducive to the prosperity of Great Britain, that she would seek in vain to procure herself similar advantages by any other means. But the British government, elated with the first successes of Burgoyne, and persuaded that fortune could not escape him, refused to listen to any overtures for accommodation, and rejected the proposition with disdain. The blindness of the British ministers was incurable; the Americans, in the midst of the most disastrous reverses, and deprived of all hope of foreign succour, strenuously refusing to renounce their independence, insisting even to make it an indispensable condition of their reconciliation, it was manifest that the reunion of the two states was become impossible; and that since the necessity of things and inexorable destiny pronounced that America should no longer be subject, it was better to have her for ally than for an enemy. But the defeat and capture of Burgoyne, by announcing with such energy the rising greatness of America, had given new ardor to the patriots; new hopes and new fears to the French. Their reciprocal situation become less ambiguous; each