CHAPTER IX.

MR Jefferson accepted the honorable commission of ambassador, and bid a final adieu to Congress, on the 11th of May, '84, Instead of returning to Monticello, the scene of his recent and distressing bereavement, he went directly to Philadelphia, took with him his eldest daughter, then in that city, and proceeded to Boston in quest of a passage. This was the only occasion on which Mr Jefferson ever visited New England; and while pursuing his journey, he made a point of stopping at the principal towns on the seaboard, to inform himself of the state of commerce in each State. With the same view he extended his route into New Hampshire. He returned to Boston, and sailed thence, on the 5th of July, in the merchant ship Ceres, bound to Cowes, where he arrived, after a pleasant voyage, on the 26th. He was detained here a few days, by the indisposition of his daughter, when he embarked for Havre, and arrived at Paris on the 6th of August. He called immediately on Dr Franklin, at Passy, communicated to him their charge and instructions; and they wrote to Mr Adams, then at the Hague, to join them at Paris.

The instructions given by Congress to the first plenipotentiaries of independent America, were a novelty in the history of international transactions; and much curiosity was manifested by the diplomatic corps of Europe, resident at the court of Versailles, to know the author of them. These instructions contemplated the introduction of numerous and fundamental reformations in the

established relations of neutrals and belligerents; which, had the propositions of our ministers been embraced by the principal powers of Europe, would have effected a series of the most substantial and desirable improvements in the international code of mankind. The principal reformations intended, were, a provision exempting from capture, by the public or private armed ships of either belligerent, when at war, all merchant vessels and their cargoes, employed merely in carrying on the commerce between nations; a provision against the molestation of fishermen, husbandmen, citizens unarmed, and following their occupations in unfortified places; for the humane treatment of prisoners of war; for the abolition of contraband of war, which exposes merchant vessels to such ruinous detentions and abuses; and for the recognition of the principle of free bottoms, free goods.'

Such were the distinguishing features of these unique instructions; and the interesting question of their authorship has never been settled until since the publication of Mr Jefferson's Private Correspondence. In a letter of his, written but a short time before his death, to John Q. Adams, then President of the United States, the whole history of the transaction is concisely stated, in answer to a special and friendly enquiry on the subject. He ascribes to Dr Franklin the merit of having suggested the principal innovations meditated by these instructions.

I am thankful for the very interesting message and documents of which you have been so kind as to send me a copy, and will state my recollections as to the particular passage of the message to which you ask my attention. On the conclusion of peace, Congress, sensible of their right to assume independence, would not condescend to ask its acknowledgment from other nations, yet were willing, by some of the ordinary international transactions, to receive what would imply that acknowledgeThey appointed commissioners, therefore, to propose treaties of commerce to the principal nations of

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Europe. I was then a member of Congress, was of the committee appointed to prepare instructions for the commissioners, was, as you suppose, the draughtsman of those actually agreed to, and was joined with your father and Doctor Franklin, to carry them into execution. But the stipulations making part of these instructions, which respected privateering, blockades, contraband, and freedom of the fisheries, were not original conceptions of mine. They had before been suggested by Doctor Franklin, in some of his papers in possession of the public, and had, I think, been recommended in some letter of his to Congress. I happen only to have been the inserter of them in the first public act, which gave the formal sanction of a public authority.'

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Agreeably to their request, Mr Adams soon joined his . colleagues of the legation, at Paris; and their first employment was to prepare a general form of treaty, based upon the broad principles of their instructions, to be proposed to each nation without discrimination, but without urging it upon any. In the conference with the Count de Vergennes, the United States having already concluded a treaty with France, it was mutually agreed to leave to legislative regulation, on both sides, such modifications of our commercial intercourse as would voluntarily flow from amicable dispositions. They next sounded the ministers of the several European nations, assembled at the court of Versailles, on the disposition of their respective governments towards mutual commerce, and the expediency of encouraging it by the protection of a treaty. The final success of their propositions to the various powers, during a twelve months term of joint diplomatic attendance in Europe, is very pleasantly and comprehensively stated by Mr Jefferson himself.

Old Frederick, of Prussia, met us cordially, and without hesitation; and, appointing the Baron de Thulemeyer, his minister at the Hague, to negotiate with us, we communicated to him our Projet, which, with little alteration by the king, was soon concluded. Denmark and Tuscany entered also into negotiations with us.

Other powers appearing indifferent, we did not think it proper to press them. They seemed, in fact, to know little about us, but as rebels, who had been successful in throwing off the yoke of the mother country. They were ignorant of our commerce, which had been always monopolized by England, and of the exchange of articles it might offer advantageously to both parties. They were inclined, therefore, to stand aloof, until they could see better what relations might be usefully instituted with us. The negotiations, therefore, begun with Denmark and Tuscany, we protracted designedly, until our powers had expired; and abstained from making new propositions to others having no colonies; because our commerce being an exchange of raw for wrought materials, is a competent price for admission into the colonies of those possessing them; but were we to give it without price to others, all would claim it without price, on the ground of gentis amicissima.'

As might have been foreseen, such was the reserve and hauteur, with which the ambassadors of independent America were treated by the representatives of the governments of the ancient world. It is true, the United States had just emerged from a subordinate condition; yet a little knowledge of the situation and resources of the people and institutions of America, would have apprised them of the rank she was destined to hold in the scale of empire, and of the nature of those relations which it was their interest to have established with her. By assuming an air of coyness and indifference, they probably imagined they could inveigle our ministers into terms more advantageous to themselves, than they were in the habit of instituting with older countries and more experienced agents. But they were met by the untutored negotiators of republican America, with an equal indifference, as just and honorable as theirs was fallacious, springing as it did, from a sense of the real value of our commerce, and a determination not to exchange it, in any case, without an adequate equivalent. As soon as

they became sensible, therefore, that they could do nothing with the greater powers, who alone might offer a competent exchange for our commerce, they prudently resolved not to hamper our country with engagements to those of less significance; and accordingly suffered their commission to expire without closing any other negotiation than that with the king of Prussia.

Thus through the short-sighted cupidity of European governments, was lost to the world a precious opportunity of commencing a reform in its international code, by the introduction of wise and beneficent principles. 'Had these governments,' says Mr Jefferson, 'been then apprised of the station we should so soon occupy among nations, all I believe, would have met us promptly and with frankness. These principles would then have been established with all, and from being the conventional law with us alone, would have slid into their engagements with one another, and become general. They have not yet found their way into written history; but their adoption by our southern brethren, will bring them into observance, and make them what they should be, a part of the law of the world, and of the reformation of principles for which they will be indebted to us.'

On the 10th of March, 1785, Mr Jefferson received the unanimous appointment of minister plenipotentiary at the court of France, as successor to Dr Franklin, who had obtained leave to return to America. He was reelected to the same station in October, '87, on the expiration of his first term, and continued to represent the United States at that court until October, 1789, when he was permitted to return to his native country.

Mr Adams was about the same time appointed minister plenipotentiary to England, and left Paris for London, in June, '85.

Mr Jefferson accepted the appointment, with a native diffidence, heightened by a sense of the extraordinary