:

our intention to depart from the basis of the treaty of Bafle respecting the civil or financial administration of those coun tries.

In concluding the treaty, by which the war between our state and the French Republic was put an end to, it was never our intention to grant them more than a mere military possession of our provinces on the left side of the Rhine, till peace should be concluded with the Emperor: and this intention, which has been taken as a basis in the negotiation, is sufficiently manifest by the tenor of the 5th article, which expressly declares, " that the troops of the Republic shall occupy these countries belonging to us."

The difference between provinces conquered from an enemy, and those which belong to a power in alliance, and which have been merely conceded for a temporary military occupation, is sufficiently evident, and it is obvious that they ought not to be treated in the fame manner.

It is therefore impoflible for us to believe that the French government, confidering the amicable ties subsisting between us and it, will still oppose such evident reasoning. It cannot fail to conceive, that neither fequestration nor confifcation of the goods of the clergy, nor the projected fale of woods, nor the enormous contribution of three millions, impofed on the country between the Meuse and the Rhine, which would entirely ruin that country, can take place with any regard to appearance of juftice.

It has already in effect given our envoy at Paris the most positive affurance, that the measures taken with respect to the clergy should be put an end to, and that the ecclefiastics should remain in quiet enjoyment of their goods and revenues: we therefore constantly expect the revocation of the order for the fale of woods, and, in general, a renunciation of all those destructive innovations relative to our dominions.

We shall not by any means recognize as 'valid the fale of woods, which has already taken place, to our great aftonishment; and we are positively determined to have recourse to the purchasers for restitution in kind, or for the value at which the property fold shall be estimated by our agents, and for the damages which shall refult from the waste committed on thefe woods.

In those cases where the purchasers cannot be found, we shall exercise our feverity on all those who are employed by these laft for cutting and carrying wood. We, in confequence, exhort our faithful subjects of the faid provinces to remain affured of our lafting and efficacious protection, and to wait with

I

con

1

confidence for the return of that ancient order of things so highly

to be defired.

1

At Wesel, in our chamber of war and territory, 29th December, 1796, in the name and on the behalf of his Majefty.

1

BARON DE STEIN, First President. Given at Emmerick, in our regency, the 29th December, 1796, in the name and on the behalf of his Majesty.

ELBERS.

Note from the Administrators of the Cantons of Cleves and Xanten to the Inhabitants of the Said Cantons.

CITIZENS, Cleves, Jan. 3. THE Director-general of the conquered countries between the Meuse and the Rhine, having the entire adminiftration of those countries, could not fee, without the greatest surprise, the order of the royal chamber of war and domains of Wesel, and of the regency of Emmerick, dated the 29th December (O. S.) which forbids the cutting down of wood fold, under the penalty of restitution and reprisal.

We should be effentially wanting in the discharge of our duties and obedience, if we fuffered other authorities to interfere in the adminiftrative affairs of our cantons, without having previoufly received a formal order from our fuperiors.

You have seen several times ordinances emanating from those authorities; you have seen also that the French government has not, on that account, discontinued the direction of Pruffian as well as of other countries-Do not doubt that they will still continue it; you will, perhaps, be convinced of it, when you shall pay attention to the manner in which the ordinances have been communicated.

We appeal to the members of those chambers, if a foreign authority were to intimate orders to them, would not they fay, with reason, " we have a fovereign, it is only to him that we owe obedience;" and would not they continue their functions without paying any attention to the order? We are therefore determined, citizens, to maintain with firmness all the operations undertaken, or to be undertaken, in the name of the government which we represent, and to punish exemplarily all those who shall shew any difobedience in any manner whatBut you have already given us fufficient marks of your obedience to make us believe, that we shall not be forced to have recourse to fuch extremities.

ever.

(Signed)

WASSEINEL.
SEIDA.

Substance

Substance of the Correspondence between the Cabinet of Berlin and the Court of Vienna, respecting the Line of Demarcation established between bis Pruffian Majesty and the French Republic

AN official note, tranfmitted by M. the Marquis Lucchesini to the minifter of his Imperial Majesty, acquainted the court of Vienna with "the intention of the court of Berlin to obtain from his Imperial Majesty his approbation of measures adopted for the security of that part of Germany, by means of an armed neutrality, announcing to him, at the fame time, that the security of these countries was the motive in which the measures referred to had originated."

Substance of the Reply made to the above Note by the Court of Vienna.

HIS Imperial Majesty, as fupreme head of the empire, cannot doubt that the states are obliged to concur in a war, rendered necessary from the preffure of circumstances, and formally declared, with all their force, for the common defence. This obligation is derived from the principle of individual and general security, which is the most sacred and the most essential basis of every conftitution. It is in a particular manner blended with the substance of the Germanic conftitution, and is recognized by feveral of its laws in the most positive terms.

Such is the result dictated by the spirit of our conftitution, which subjects all the respective states, and all the means of defence, to the general controul of the fovereign power of the Germanic empire. Such is the result of the oath of fealty, which the electors, princes, and states of the empire, in order to strengthen the focial bond, take in their capacity of vassals, by which they swear actively to concur in every step which can tend to the honour, to the advantage, and to the profperity of his Imperial Majesty and of the empire, and which, by consequence, imposes upon them an obligation to second, with all their might, the measures adopted by the chief and the states of the empire, to avert the danger which threatens them with total destruction.

His Imperial Majesty fees with pain that the appearances of the war by no means answer the expectation which he had been led to entertain; but in considering the fundamental laws of every well organized constitution, and the principles recognized in the most positive terms in the laws of the empire, full of anxiety for the good of the country, his Majesty cannot refrain from manifesting a defire that the corps, assembled at a crisis the most alarming and the most dangerous, may be employed rather in aiding a most just defence, by oppofing the common enemy, than in stopping an invasion still at a distance, and of which we apprehend only the poffibility.

The fe

These measures of security, confidered in themselves, do not appear to be contrary to the basis and the spirit of the constitution, provided that the arrangements, for the fafety and the particular defence of the north of Germany, are not founded upon illegal fuppofitions, and provided they are not employed to fanction the unconstitutional pretext of freeing them from the obligations binding upon them by the register of the resolutions of the empire, decreed for the purpose of the general security of Germany.

If his Imperial Majesty on the present occafion were to grant to this measure of fecurity, as it is termed in the circular letter of the Pruffian minifter, in the letters of convocation, and in the declarations of the plenipotentiaries of the King, an unlimited approbation, all who should compare it with the tenor of the decree of ratification of the 29th of July, 1795, would accuse him of adopting contradictory measures, and of making an arbitrary use of his power as head of the empire, since the laws renewed in the present war forbid the states to separate, on any occafion, from the general association, and any armanent, under the title of an armed neutrality, during the continuance of a war of the empire, and interdict them in the most positive manner from arbitrarily renouncing obligations formerly imposed upon them for the common defence.

His Imperial Majesty, in virtue of the sacred duties imposed upon him by his high office as supreme head of the empire, on the other hand, being called upon to defend the rights of the Germanic constitution against every step and every principle incompatible with their safety, to preserve to the empire, and to every particular state, its immunities entire, and to guard them against the prejudices which may arise from these measures, will be disposed in the mean time to grant them his approbation, if they are confined to the legal defence of the countries, and if they do not depart from the principles, the forms, and the obligations, prescribed by the laws and the constitution.

Papers

Papers relative to Neutral Powers.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

Philadelphia, June 15.

Proteft from Captain George Dominick and the first and second Officers of the Ship Mount Vernon, lately captured by the Flying Fish French Privateer.

BY this public inftrument of protest, be it made known and manifeft, that on this day, the 11th of June, in the year of our Lord 1796, before me, Clement Biddle, notary public of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, duly commiffioned and by law authorifed to administer oatlıs, dwelling in the city of Philadelphia, perfonally came and appeared Captain G. Dominick, commander of the ship Mount Vernon, of Philadelphia, of the burden of 425 tons, or thereabouts, and being duly sworn ac cording to law, on his folemn oath deposes and says, that the faid fhip, under his command, left the city of Philadelphia on the 2d day of this present month, bound to Cowes in Great Britain, and a market; that on the 4th day of this same month, the appearer got under weigh with his ship at Newcastle, and proceeded on his voyage down the river and bay of Delaware, and on the 9th instant, about fix o'clock in the morning, he difcharged his pilot, and in about two hours after, with a light wind from the fouth-south-east, Cape Helopen bearing west, distance about fix leagues, and the light-house then in fight, about eight o'clock in the morning, they discovered a schooner about one league a-head, and to windward, which bore down on them, and fired a gun, and ordered the ship to fend their boat on board the schooner, which this appearer immediately complied with, fupputing there was nothing wanting but to fee his papers, which he knew to be perfectly clear; and fuppofing he had nothing to apprehend from the schooner, therefore fent his fecond officer and four hands in his boat on board her, to know their demands, but they detained his officer and the boat's crew, and fent the boat back to the ship with fourteen armed men, with orders to take him on board the schooner, with the ship's papers; they declared that the thip was loaded with naval stores, and this appearer knowing that their fufpicions were groundless,

and