extend, or be construed to extend, to protect any vessel which shall attempt to enter any port actually blockaded by any of his majesty's ships of war.

And the right honourable the lords commissioners of his majesty's treasury, bis majesty's principal secretary of state, the lords commissioners of the admiralty, and the judge of high court of admiralty, and the judges of the courts of vice admiralty, are to take the necessary measures herein as to them may respectively appertain. STEPH. COTTRELL.

SIR,

Mr. Pinkney to Mr. Canning.

GREAT CUMBERLAND PLACE, MAY 29, 1809.

I HAVE received the communication which you did me the honour to address to me on the 27th instant, and will hasten to transmit it to the secretary of state of the United States.

No instructions or information from my government concerning the transactions in America to which your communication alludes having yet reached me, I can only express my concern that the conciliatory arrangements concerted and concluded, as you have done me the honour to inform me, between the American secretary of state, and his majesty's accredited minister at Washington, acting in consequence, and professing to act in pursuance, of regular instructions from his court, are not likely to have all that effect which was naturally to have been expected from them. I have the honour to be, &c.

(Signed)

WILLIAM PINKNEY.

The Rt. Hon. GEORGE CANNING, &c. &c. &c.

Mr. Erskine to Mr. Smith.

SIR,

WASHINGTON, JULY 31, 1809.

I HAVE the honour to enclose to you a copy of an order, which was passed by his majesty in council on the 24th of May last.

In communicating this order, it is with the deepest regret that I have to inform you that his majesty has not thought proper to confirm the late provisional agreement which I had entered into with you on the part of our respective governments.

Neither the present time, nor the occasion will afford me a favourable opportunity for explaining to you the grounds and reasons upon which I conceived I had conformed to his majesty's wishes; and to the spirit, at least, of my instructions upon that subject; nor, indeed, would any vindication of my conduct, (whatever I may have to offer,) be of any importance, further than as it might tend to show that no intention existed on my part to practice any deception towards the government of the United States.

I have the satisfaction, however, to call your attention to that part of the enclosed order, which protects the commerce and shipping of the United States, from the injury and inconveniences, which might have arisen to American citizens from a reliance on the provisional agreement before mentioned; and I cannot but cherish a hope that no further bad consequences may result from an arrangement, which I had fully believed would have met his majesty's approbation, and would have led to a complete and cordial understanding between the two countries.

With sentiments of the highest respect, &c.

(Signed)

The Hon. ROBERT SMITH, &c. &c. &c.

SIR,

D. M. ERSKINE.

The Secretary of State to Mr. Erskine.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, aug. 9, 1809.

I HAVE just received from Mr. Pinkney a letter, enclosing a printed paper, purporting to be a copy of a despatch to you from Mr. Canning, which states among other things that from the report of your conversations with Mr. Madison, Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Smith it appears;

1st. That the American government is prepared in the event of his majesty's consenting to withdraw the orders *Von. III.

62

in council of January and November, 1807, to withdraw contemporaneously on its part, the interdiction of its harbours to ships of war, and all non-intercourse and nonimportation acts, so far as respects Great Britain, leaving them in force with respect to France and the powers which adopt or act under her decrees.

"2d. That America is willing to renounce, during the present war, the pretension of carrying on in time of war all trade with the enemies' colonies, from which she was excluded during peace.

"3d. Great Britain for the purpose of securing the operation of the embargo, and the bona fide intention of America, to prevent her citizens from trading with France, and the powers adopting and acting under the French decrees, is to be considered as being at liberty to capture all such American vessels, as may be found attempting to trade with the ports of any of these powers; without which security for the observance of the embargo, the raising it nominally with respect to Great Britain alone, would in fact, raise it with respect to all the world."

I have the honour to request you to favour me with such explanations as your candour will at once suggest, in relation to these imputed conversations.

I forbear to expresss to you, sir, the surprise that is felt at the extraordinary pretensions set forth in this letter of instruction, and especially at the expectation that this government would, as a preliminary, recognise conditions, two of which are so manifestly irreconcilable to the dignity and interest of the United States. I, however, would remark, that had you deemed it proper to have communicated in extenso this letter, it would have been impossible for the President to have perceived in its conditions, or in its spirit, that conciliatory disposition, which had been professed, and which, it was hoped, had really existed. I have the honour to be, &c.

(Signed)

Hon. DAVID M. ERSKINE, &c. &c. &c.

R. SMITH.

SIR,

Mr. Erskine to Mr. Smith.

WASHINGTON, AUG. 14, 1809.

I HAVE the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 9th instant, informing me that you had just received a letter from Mr. Pinkney, enclosing a printed paper, purporting to be a copy of a despatch to me from Mr. Canning, which states, among other things," from the report of your conversations with Mr. Madison, Mr. Gallatin, and Mr. Smith, it appears:

1st. That the American government is prepared, in the event of his majesty's consenting to withdraw the orders in council of January and November, 1807, to withdraw contemporaneously, on its part, the interdiction of its harbours to ships of war, and all non-intercourse and non-importation acts so far as respects Great Britain, leaving them in force with respect to France, and the powers which adopt, or act under her decrees.

"2d. That America is willing to renounce, during the present war, the pretension of carrying on, in time of war, all trade with the enemy's colonies, from which she was excluded during peace.

"3d. Great Britain, for the purpose of securing the operation of the embargo, and the bona fide intention of America to prevent her citizens from trading with France, and the powers adopting and acting under the French decrees, is to be considered as being at liberty to capture all such American vessels as may be found attempting to trade with the ports of any of these powers; without which security for the observance of the embargo, the raising it nominally with respect to Great Britain alone, would, in fact, raise it with respect to all the world."

The explanations which you request from me upon that subject shall be given with candour; and I will proceed, accordingly, to lay before you an abstract of the communications which I made to his majesty's government, relative to the unofficial conversations which I had

held with Mr. Madison, (then secretary of state) Mr. Gallatin, and yourself, at the time and upon the occasion alluded to by his majesty's secretary of state (Mr. Canning) in that part of his instructions to me, of which you inform me you have received a printed copy from Mr. Pinkney.

Upon referring to my despatches, addressed to his majesty's government of the 3d and 4th of December last, in which these communications are detailed, I conclude that the conversations alluded to must have been held some days previous to that period, and were to the following effect.

Mr. Madison (then secretary of state) is represented by me to have urged various arguments tending to prove that the United States had exerted all their efforts to persuade the French government to withdraw their unjust restrictions upon neutral commerce, and that recourse might have been had to measures of more activity and decision against France than mere remonstrances, but that, in the mean time, Great Britain had issued her orders in council, before it was known whether the United States would acquiesce in the aggressions of France, and thereby rendered it impossible to distinguish between the conduct of the two belligerents, who had equally committed aggressions against the United States.

After some other observations, Mr. Madison is stated by me at that time to have added, that as the world must be convinced that America had in vain taken all the means in her power to obtain from Great Britain and France a just attention to her rights as a neutral power, by representations and remonstrances, that she would be fully justified in having recourse to hostilities with either belligerent, and that she only hesitated to do so from the difficulty of contending with both; but that she must be driven even to endeavour to maintain her rights against the two greatest powers in the world, unless either of them should relax their restrictions upon neutral commerce; in which case, the United States would at once side with