John Quincy Adams

led in the veins of the infant. If heredity counts for anything he began life with an excellent chance of becoming famous-non sine d?s animosus infans. He was called after his great-grandfathe

lized upon it in his

e his name. The fact, recorded by my father at the time, has connected with that portion of my name a charm of mingled sensibility and devotion. It was filial tenderness that gave the name. It was the name o

isten to the sounds of conflict upon Bunker's Hill, and to watch the flaming ruin of Charlestown. Profound was the impression made upon him by the spectacle, and it was intensified by many an hour spent afterward upon the same spot during the siege and bombardment of Boston. Then John Adams went as a delegate to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, and his wife and children were left for twelve months, as John Quincy Adams says,-it is to be hoped with a

e lad had a natural aptitude or affinity for knowledge which stood him in better stead than

, June th

gned to have got it half through by this time. I have determined this week to be more diligent, as Mr. Thaxter will be absent at Court and I Cannot pursue my other Studies. I have Set myself a Stent and determine to read the 3d volume Half out. If I can but keep my resolution I will write again at the end of t

book, I will transcribe the most remarkable occurrences I met

ade his first acquaintance with the foreign lands where so many of his coming years were to be passed. This initial visit, however, was brief; and he was hardly well established at school when events caused his father to start for home. Unfortunately this return trip was a needless loss of time, since

tember the

who takes a great deal of pains to put me in the right way, has also advised me to Preserve Copies of all my letters, and has given me a Convenient Blank Book for this end; and altho' I shall have the mortification a few years hence to read a great deal of my Childish nonsense, yet I shall have the Pleasure and advantage of Remarking the several steps by which I

ing to you." What gratification must this letter from one who was quite justified in signing himself her "dutiful and affectionate son" have brought to the Puritan bosom of the good mother at home! If the plan for the diary was n

al by J

erica t

l.

y, 12 of No

of the past ages. Any mistakes which may be made in estimating his mental or moral attributes must be charged to the dulness or prejudice of the judge, who could certainly not ask for better or more abundant evidence. Few of us know our most intimate friends better than any of us may know Mr. Adams, if we will but take the trouble. Even the brief extracts already given from his correspondence show us the boy; it only concerns us to get them into the proper light for seeing them accurately. If a lad of seven, nine, or eleven years of age should write such solemn little effusions amid the surroundings and influences of the present day, he would probably be set down justly enough as either an offensive young prig or a prematurely developed

egree of belief in his fellow men will turn to the wall all the portraits in the gallery except only the inimitable one of the writer himself. For it would be altogether too discouraging to think that so wide an experience of men as Mr. Adams enjoyed through his long, varied, and active life must lead to such an unpleasant array of human faces as those which are scattered along these twelve big octavos. Fortunately at present we have to do with only one of these likenesses, and that one we are able to admire while knowing also that it is beyond question accurate. One after another every trait of Mr. Adams comes out; we shall see that he was a man of a very high and noble character veined with some very notable and disagreeable blemishes; his aspirations were honorable, even the lowest of them being more than simply respectable; he had an avowed ambition, but it was of that pure kind which led him to render true and distinguished services to his countrymen; he was not only a zealous patriot, but a profound believer in the sound and practicable tenets of the liberal political creed of the United States; he had one of the most honest and independent natures that was ever given to man; personal integrity of course goes without saying, but he had the rarer gift of an elevated and rigid political honesty such as has been unfrequently seen in any age or any nation; in times of severe trial this quality was even cruelly tested, but we shall never see it fail; he was as courageous as if he had been a fanatic; indeed, for a long part of his life to maintain a single-handed fight in support of a despised or unpopular opinion seemed his natural function and almost exclusive calling; he was thoroughly conscientious and never knowingly did wrong, nor even sought to persuade himself that wrong was right; well read in literature and of wide and varied information

mpossible. All that can be attempted is to present a sketch of the man with a few of his more prominent surroundings against a very meagre and insufficient background of the history of the times. So it may be permissible to b

lly found himself engaged in a diplomatic career. Francis Dana, afterward Chief Justice of Massachusetts, was then accredited as an envoy to Russia from the United States, and he took Mr. Adams with him as his private secretary. Not much came of the mission, but it was a valuable experience for a lad of his years. Upon his return he spent six months in travel and then he rejoined his father in Par

l have brought a blush to the cheeks of some among his elders, at least if the tongue of slander wags not with gross untruth concerning the colleagues of John Adams. But he was not in Europe to amuse himself, though at an age when amusement is natural and a tinge of sinfulness is so often pardoned; he was there with the definite and persistent purpose of steady improvement and acquisition. At his age most young men play the cards which a kind fortune puts into their hands, with the reckless intent only of immediate gain, but from the earliest moment when he began the game of life Adams coolly and wisely husbanded every card which came into his hand, with a steady view to probable future contingencies, and with the resolve to win in the long run. So now the resolution which he took in the present question illustrated the clearnes

he world and among company for three; to return to spend one or two years in the pale of a college, subjected to all the rules which I have so long been freed from; and afterwards not expect (however good an opinion I may hav

how w

, that hangs on

dren will have to provide for themselves, which I shall never be able to do if I loiter away my precious time in Europe and shun going home until I am forced to it. With an ordinary share of common sense, which I hope I enjoy, at least in America I can live independent and free; and rather tha

ospects were widely different from those of the society about him. He must have been strongly imbued by nature with the instincts of his birthplace to have formed, after a seve

ion to more regular maritime business, and entered as a law student the office of Theophilus Parsons, afterwards the Chief Justice of Massachusetts. On July 15, 1790, being twenty-three years old, he was admitted to practice. Immediately afterward he established himself in Boston, where for a time

and perplexing question of the neutrality which should be observed by this country in European wars. These were followed by more, over the signature of Columbus, and afterward by still more in the name of Barnevelt, all strongly reprobating the course of the crazy-headed foreigner. The writer was not permitted to remain long unknown. It is not certain, but it is highly probable, that to these articles was due the nomination which Mr. Adams received shortly afterward from President Washington, as Minister Resident at the Hague. This nomination was sent in to the Senate, May 29, 1794, and was unanimously confirmed on the following day. It may be imagined that the change from the moderate practice of his Boston law office to a European court, of which he so well knew the charms, was not distasteful to him. There are passages in his Diary which

an unpleasant position by the new condition of affairs, but on the contrary he was very cordially treated by the French and their Dutch partisans, and was obliged to fall back upon his native prudence to resist their compromising overtures and dangerous friendship. Without giving offence he yet kept clear of entanglements, and showed a degree of wisdom and skill which many older and more experienced Americans failed to evince, either abroad or at home, during these exciting years. But he appeared to be left without occupation in the altered condition of affairs, and therefore was considering the propriety of returning, when advices from home induced hi

ver, some further business of an informal character to transact with Lord Grenville, and in endeavoring to conduct it found himself rather awkwardly placed. He was not minister to the Court of St. James, having been only vaguely authorized to discuss certain arrangements in a tentative way, without the power to enter into any definitive agreement. But the English Cabinet strongly disliking Mr. Deas, who in the absence of Mr. Pinckney represented for the time the U

a Johnson, then American Consul at London, and niece of that Governor Johnson, of Maryland, who had signed the Declaration of Independence and was afterwards placed on the bench of the Suprem

e could neither solicit nor expect anything, he justly said, and he was pained that his mother should not know him better than to entertain any apprehension of his feeling otherwise. It was a perplexing position in which the two were placed. It would be a great hardship to cut short the son's career because of the success of the father, yet the reproach of nepotism could not be lightly encountered, even with the backing of clear consciences. Washington came kindly to the aid of his doubting successor, and in

ties, he found not much more to be done at Berlin than there had been at the Hague. But such useful work as was open to him he accomplished in the shape of a treaty of amity and commerce between Prussia and the United States. This having been duly ratified by both the powers, his further stay seemed so useless that he wrote home suggesting his readiness to return; and while awaiting a reply he travelled th

om the capital, actually in a wild rage, on the night of the 3d of March, 1801, to avoid the humiliating pageant of Mr. Jefferson's inauguration. Yet far more fierce than this natural party warfare was the internal dissension which rent the Federal party in twain. Those cracks upon the surface and subterraneous rumblings, which the experienced observer could for some time have noted, had opened with terrible uproar into a gaping chasm, when John Adams, still in the Presidency, suddenly announced his determination to send a mission to France at a crisis when nearly all his party were looking for war. Perhaps this step was, as his admirers claim, an act of pure and disinterested statesmanship. Certainly its result was fortunate for the country at large. But for John Adams it was ruinous. At the moment when he made the bold move, he doubtless expected to be followed by his party. Extreme was his disappointment and boundless his wrath, when he found that he had at his back only a fraction, not improbably less than half, of that party. He learned with infinite chagrin that he had only

s faction. His proclivities had always been with that party. In Massachusetts the educated and well-to-do classes were almost unanimously of that way of thinking. The select coterie of gentlemen in the State, who in those times bore an active and influential part in politics, were nearly all Hamiltonians, but the adherents of President Adams were numerically strong. Nor was the younger Adams himself long left without his private grievance against Mr. J

the hardihood to propose that the Federalist majority in the legislature should permit the Republican minority to enjoy a proportional representation in the council. "It was the first act of my legislative life," he wrote many years afterward, "and it marked the principle by which my whole public life has been governed from that day to this. My proposal was unsuccessful, and perhaps it forfeited whatever confidence might have been otherwise bestowed upon me as a party follower." Indeed, all his life long Mr. Adams was never submissive to the party whip, but voted upon every question precisely according to his opinion of its merits, without the slightest regard to the political company in which for the time being he might find himself. A compeer of his in the United States Senate once said of him, that he regarded

ainly did not weary the Senators, yet whenever he rose to his feet he was sure of a cold, too often almost an insulting, reception. By no chance or possibility could anything which he said or suggested please his prejudiced auditors. The worst augury for any measure was his support; any motion which he made was sure to be voted down, though not unfrequently substantially the same matter being afterward moved by somebody else would be readily carried. That cordiality, assistance, and sense of fellowship which Senators from the same State customarily expect and obtain from each other could not be enjoyed by him. For shortly after his arrival in Washington, Mr. Pickering had been chosen to fill a vacancy in the other Massachusetts senatorship, and appeared upon the scene as a most unwelcome colleague. For a time, indeed, an outward semblance of political comradeship was maintained between them, but it would have been folly for an Adams to put faith in a Pickering, and perhaps vice versa. This position of his, as the unpopular member of an unpopular minority, could not be misunderstood, and many allusions to it occur in his Diary. One day he notes a motion rejected; another day, that he has "nothing to do but to make fruitless opposition;" he constantly recites that he has voted with a small minority, and at least once he himself

and an obstinate courage, an invincible confidence in his own judgment, and a stern conscientiousness carried him through these earlier years of severe trial as they had afterwards to carry him through many more. "The qualities of mind most peculiarly called for," he reflects in the Diary, "are firmness, perseverance, patience, coolness, and forbearance. The prospect is not promising; yet the part to act may be as

omfortable life amid the struggles of party. Under the disadvantages involved in this habit Mr. Adams labored to a remarkable degree. Since parties were first organized in this Republic no American statesman has ever approached him in persistent freedom of thought, speech, and action. He was regarded as a Federalist, but his

n the discussions and votes which took place in this business Mr. Adams was in favor of the purchase, but denied with much emphasis the constitutionality of the process by which the purchased territory was brought into the fellowship of States. This imperfect allegiance to the party gave more offence than satisfaction, and he found himself soundly berated in leading Federalist newspapers in New England, and angrily threatened with expulsion from the party. But in the famous impeachment of Judge Chase, which aroused very strong feelings, Mr. Adams was fortunately able to vote for acquittal.

him ever to achieve influence. In time, however, Mr. Adams saw gratifying indi

rmly avoided to take a lead; any other course would have been dishonest or ridiculous. On the very few and unimportant objects which I did underta

e accepted as correct upon his sole authority without other evidence. But the fair prospect was overcas

ur national politics, when our parties were not divided upon American questions, but wholly by their sympathies with one or other of these contending European powers. Under Washington the English party had, with infinite difficulty, been able to prevent their adversaries from fairly enlisting the United States as active partisans of France, in spite of the fact that most insulting treatment was received from that country. Under John Adams the same so-called British faction had been baulked in their hope of precipitating a war with the French. Now in Mr. Jefferson's second administration, the French

United States, a violation of their neutral rights, and an encroachment upon their national independence." By his second resolution, the President was requested to demand and insist upon the restoration of property seized under this pretext, and upon indemnification for property already confiscated. By a rare good fortune, Mr. Adams had the pleasure of seeing his propositions carried, only slightly modified by the omission of the words "to insist." But they were carried, of course, by Republican votes, and they by no means advanced their mover in the favor of the Federalist party. Strange as it may seem, that party, of which many of the foremost supporters were engaged in the very commerce which Great Britain aimed to suppress and destroy

rnest to confiscate all vessels and cargoes captured on their way from any neutral nation to any port within the proscribed district. On November 21, next following, Napoleon retaliated by the Berlin decree, so called, declaring the entire British Isles to be under blockade, and forbidding any vessel which had been in any English port after publication of his decree to enter any port in the dominions under his control. In January, 1807, England made the next move by an order, likewise in contravention of international law, forbidding to neutrals all commerce between ports of the enemies of Great Britain. On November 11, 1807, the famous British Order in Council was issued, declaring neutral vessels and cargoes bound to any port or colony of any country with which England was then at war, and which was closed to English ships, to be liable to capture and confiscation. A few days later, November 25, 1807, another Order established a rate of duties to be paid in England upon all neutral merchandise which should be permitted to be carried in neutral botto

se pretence to right; but with the acknowledgment that they were Americans, they were seized upon the plea of a necessity for their services in the British ship. Some American vessels were left so denuded of seamen that they were lost at sea for want of hands to man them; the destruction of lives as well as property, unquestionably thus caused, was immense. When after the lapse of a long time and of infinite negotiation the American citizenship of some individual was clearly shown, still the chances of his return were small; some false and ignoble subterfuge was resorted to; he was not to be found; the name did not occur on the rolls of the navy; he had died, or been discharged, or had deserted, or had been shot. The more illegal the act committed by any British officer the more sure he was of reward, till it seemed that the impressment of American citizens was an even surer road to promotion than valor in an engagement with the enemy. Such were the substantial wrongs inflicted by Great Britain; nor were any pains taken to cloak their character; on the contrary, they were done with more than British insolence and offensiveness, and were accompanied with insults which alone constituted sufficient provocation to war. To all this, for a long time, nothing but empty and utterly futile protests were opposed by this country. The affair of the Chesapeake, indeed, threatened for a brief moment to bring things to a crisis. That vessel, an American

t of the British and French decrees. The former wrought serious injury, falling little short of total destruction, to American shipping and commerce; the latter were only in a much less degree hurtful. The immense naval power of England and the channels in which our trade naturally flowed combined to make her destructive capacity as toward

ved overmuch. They were being ruthlessly destroyed by their friends, to whom they had been, so to speak, almost disloyally loyal. They saw their business annihilated, their property seized, and yet could not give utterance to resentment, or counsel resistance, without such a humiliating devouring of all their own principles and sentiments as they could by no possibility bring themselves to endure. There was but one road open to them, and that was the ignoble one of casting themselves wholly into the arms of England, of rewarding her blows with caresses, of submitting to be fairly scourged into a servile alliance with her. It is not surprising that the independent temper of Mr. Adams revolted at the position which hi

British minister of foreign affairs. From all that he had thus seen and heard he had reached the conviction, unquestionably correct, that the British were not only resolved to adopt a selfish course towards the United States, which might have been expected, but that they were consistently pursuing the further distinct design of crippling and destroying American commerce, to the utmost degree which their own extensive trade and great naval authority and power rendered possible. So long as he held this firm belief, it was inevitable that he should be at issue with the Federalists in all matters concerning our policy towards Great Britain. The ill-will naturally engendered in him by this conviction was increased to profound indignation when illiberal measures were succeeded by insults, by substantial wrongs in direct contravention of law, and by acts properly to be described as of real hostility. For Mr. Adams was by nature not only independent, but resentful and combative. When, soon after the attack of the Leopard upon the Chesapeake, he heard the transaction "openly justified at noon-day," by a prominent Federalist,[1] "in a public insurance office upon the exchange at Boston," his temper rose. "This," he afterward wrote, "this was the cause ... which alienated me from that day and forever from the councils of the Federal party." When the news of that outrage reached Boston, Mr. Adams was there, and desired that the leading Federalists in the city should at once "take the lead in promoting a strong and clear expression of the sentiments of the people, and in an open and free-hearted manner, setting aside all party feelings, declare their determination at that crisis to support the governme

y the ignorant policy of this Virginian President. Terrible then was their wrath, when they actually saw a Massachusetts Senator boldly give his vote for what they deemed the most odious and wicked bill which had ever been presented in the halls of Congress. Nay, more, they learned with horror that Mr. Adams had even been a member of the committee which reported the bill, and that he had joined in the report. Henceforth the Federal party was to be like a hive of enraged hornets about the devoted renegade. No abuse which they cou

than to hamper a man so pacific and spiritless as Mr. Jefferson; to show a readiness to forward even his imperfect expedients; to display a united and indignant, if not quite a hostile front to Great Britain, rather than to exhibit a tame and friendly feeling towards her. It was for these reasons, which had already controlled his action concerning the non-importation bill, that Mr. Adams joined in reporting the embargo bill and voted for it. He never pretended that he himself had any especial fancy for either of these measures, or that he regarded them as the best that could be devised under the circumstances. On the contrary, he hoped that the passage of the embargo would allow of the repeal of its predecessor. That he expected some good from it, and that it did some little good, cannot be denied. It did save a great deal of American property, both shipping and merchandise, from seizure and condemnation; and if it cut off the income it at least saved much of the principal of our merchants. If only the bill had been promptly repealed so soon as this protective purpose had been achieved, without awaiting further and altogether impossible benefits to accrue from it as an offensive measure, it might perhaps hav

3, 1808, anticipating by many months the customary time for filling the coming vacancy, the legislature of Massachusetts proceeded to choose James Lloyd, junior, his successor. The votes were, in the Senate 21 for Mr. Lloyd, 17 for Mr. Adams; in the House 248 for Mr. Lloyd, and 213 for Mr. Adams. A more insulting method of administering a

rom one camp to the other. The gentlemen of wealth, position, and influence in Eastern Massachusetts, almost to a man, turned against him with virulence; many of their descendants still cherish the ancestral prejudice; and it may yet be a long while before the last mutterings of this deep-rooted antipathy die away. But that they will die away in time cannot be doubted. Praise will succeed to blame. Truth must prevail in a case where such abundant evidence is accessible; and the truth is that Mr. Adams's conduct was not ignoble, mean, and traitorous, but honorable, courageous, and disinterested. Those who singled him out for assault, though deaf to his arguments, mi

nd that it owes its downfall to assuming an erroneous attitude towards some subsequent matter which becomes in turn of predominating importance. Sometimes, though rarely, a party remains on the right side through two or even more successive issues of profound consequence to the nation. The Federalist mission was to establish the Constitution of the United States as a vigorous, efficient, and practical system of government, to prove its soundness, safety, and efficacy, and to defend it from the undermining assaults of those who distrusted it and would have reduced it to imbecility. Supplementary and cognate to this was the further task of giving the young nation and the new system a chance to get fairly started in life before being subjected to the strain of war and European entanglements. To this end it was necessary to hold in check the Jeffersonian or French party, who sought to embroil us in a foreign quarrel.

ave crisis was created by this system of organized destruction of property and wholesale stealing of citizens, now suddenly practised with such terrible energy. What was to be done? What had the two great parties to advise concerning the policy of the country in this hour of peril? Unfortunately for the Federalists old predilections were allowed now to govern their present action. Excusably Anglican in the bygone days of Genet's mission, they now remained still Anglican, when to be Anglican was to be emphatically un-American. As one reads the history of 1807 and 1808 it is impossible not to feel almost a sense of personal gratitude to John Quincy Adams that he dared to step out from his meek-spirited party and do all that circumstances rendered possible to promote resist

ion when it is so much as possible seriously to question the purity of his motives-for the story of his intrigue with Mr. Clay to secure the Presidency was never really believed by any one except General Jackson, and the beliefs of General Jackson are of little consequence. From the earliest to the latest day of his public life, he was never a party man. He is entitled to the justification to be derived from this life-long habit, when, in 1807-8, he voted against the wishes of those who had hoped to hold him in the bonds of partisan alliance. In point of fact, so far from these acts being a yielding to selfish and calculating temptation, they called for great courage and strength of mind; instead of being tergiversation, they were a triumph in a severe ordeal. Mr. Adams was not so dull as to underrate, nor so void of good feeling as to be careless of, the storm of obl

t these advances in a manner frigid and repellent even beyond his wont, and far from seeking to conciliate these emissaries, and to make a bargain, or even establish a tacit understanding for his own benefit, he held them far aloof, and simply stated that he wished and expected nothing from the administration. His mind w

r anticipated the possible publication of these private pages, yet he could hardly have done so at this early day. Among certain general reflections at the close of the year 1808, he writes: "On most of the great national questions now under discussion, my sense of duty leads me to support the Administration, and I find myself, of course, in opposition to the Federalists in general. But I have no communication with

esentatives, but to the gentleman who waited upon him with this proposal he returned a decided negat

s, without the least resistance; more than once, where the pleasure of disappointing me has seemed to be the prominent principle of decision. Of the preparatory business, matured in committees, I have had a share, gradually increasing through the four sessions, but always as a subordinate member. The merely laborious duties have been readily assigned to me, and as readily undertaken and discharged. My success has been more frequent in opposition than in carrying any proposition of my own, and I hope I have been instrumental in arresting many unadvised purposes and projects. Though as to the general policy of the country I have been uniformly in a small, and constantly deceasing minority; my opinions and votes have been much oftener in unison with the Administration than with their opponents; I have met with at least a

, had Mr. Madison fairly taken the oath of office as President than he bethought him of Mr. Adams, now no longer a Federalist, but, concerning the present issues, of the Republican persuasion. On March 6, 1809, Mr. Adams was notified by the President personally of the intention to nominate him as Minister Plenipotentiary to Russia. It was a new mission, the first minister ever nominated to Russia having been only a short time before rejected by the Senate. But the Emperor had often expressed his wish to exchange ministers, and Mr. Madison was anxious to comply with the courteous request. Mr. Adams's name was accordingly at once sent to the Senate. But on the following day, March 7, that body resolved that "it i

inners, diplomatic and other, launches, displays of fireworks, birthday festivities, parades, baptisms, plays, state funerals, illuminations, and Te Deums for victories; in short, every species of social gayety and public pageant. At all these Mr. Adams was always a bidden and apparently a welcome guest. It must be admitted, even by his detractors, that he was an admirable representative of the United States abroad. Having already seen much of the distinguished society of European courts, but retaining a republican simplicity, which was wholly genuine and a natural part of his character and therefore was never affected or offensive in its manifestations, he really represented the best element in the politics and society of the United States. Winning respect for himself he won it also for the country which he represented. Thus he was able to render an indirect but essential service in cementing the kindly feeling which the Russian Empire entertained for the American Republic. Russia could then do us little good and almost no harm, yet the friendship of a great European power had a certain moral

s," writes Mr. Adams, "I have endeavored to consider it as an affair in which I, as an American minister, had no concern; and that my only principle is to dispute upon precedence wi

d: "Mons. Adams, il y a cent ans que je ne vous ai vu;" and then continuing the conversation, "asked me whether I intended to take a house in the country this summer. I said, No.... 'And why so?' said he. I was hesitating upon an answer

ourt of Russia. These feelings waxed stronger as it grew daily more likely that the Emperor would have to take his turn also as a party defendant in the great conflict. Then at last came the fact of war, the invasion of Russia, the burning of Moscow, the disastrous retreat of the invaders ending in ignominious flight, the advance of the allies, finally the capture of Paris. All this while Mr. Adams at St. Peters

men, however, arrived in St. Petersburg only to find themselves in a very awkward position. Their official character might not properly be considered as attaching unless England should accept the offer of mediation. But England had refused, in the first instance, to do this, and she now again reiterated her refusal without regard for the manifestation of willingness on the part of the United States. Further, Mr. Gallatin's nomination was rejected by the Senate after his departu

gnore that the outlook did not promise better fortunes in the future than had been encountered in the past. On the other hand, England had nothing substantial to expect from a continuance of the struggle, except heavy additional expenditure which it was not then the fashion to compel the worsted party to recoup. She accordingly intimated her readiness to send Commissioners to G?ttingen, for which place Ghent was afterwards substituted, to meet American Comm

sufficiently surprising to be regarded as a miracle. At the very beginning, or even before fairly beginning, the British party roused the jealous ire of the Americans by proposing that they all should meet, for exchanging their full powers, at the lodgings of the Englishmen. The Americans took fire at this "offensive pretension to superiority" which was "the usage from Ambassadors to Ministers of an inferior order." Mr. Adams cited Martens, and Mr. Bayard read a case from Ward's "Law of Nations." Mr. Adams suggested sending a pointed reply, agreeing to meet the British Commissioners "

ns should be nowhere conterminous, upon which belt or barrier neither power should be permitted to encroach even by purchase, and the boundaries of which should be settled in this treaty. 2. That the United States should keep no naval force upon the Great Lakes, and should neither maintain their existing forts nor build new ones upon their northern frontier; it was even required that the boundary line should run along the southern

territory which it was now proposed to make inalienably Indian. He said that these people, amounting perhaps to one hundred thousand, "must shift for themselves." The one-sided disarmament upon the lakes and along the frontier was, by the understanding of all nations, such an humiliation as is inflicted only on a crushed adversary. No return was offered for the road between Halifax and Quebec; nor for the right of navigating the Mississippi. The treaty of peace of 1783, made in ignorance of the topography of the unexplored northern country, had established an impossible boundary line running from the Lake of the Woods westward along the forty-ninth parall

n preparing a long dispatch to the home government, to insert "a paragraph complimentary to the personal deportment" of the British. But before they sent off the document they revised it and struck out these pleasant phrases. Not many days after the first conference Mr. Adams not

think it should be. It is too much on the defensive, and too excessive in the caution to say nothing irritating. I have seldom been

sive to the Englishmen; Mr. Clay would draw his pen through every figurative expression; Mr. Russell, not content with agreeing to all the objections of both the others, would further amend the construction of every sentence; and finally Mr. Bayard would insist upon writing all over again in his own language. All this nettled Mr. Adams exceedingly. On September 24 he again writes that it was agreed to adopt an article which he had drawn, "though with objections to almost every word" which he had used. "This," he says, "is a severity with which I alone am treated in our discussions by all my colleagues. Almost everything written by any of the rest is rejected, or agreed to with very little criticism, verbal or substantial. But every line that I write passes a gauntlet of objections by every one of my colleagues, which finally issues, for the most part, in the rejection of it all." He reflects, with a somewhat forced air of self-discipline, that this must indicate some faultiness in his composition which he must try to correct; but in fact it is sufficiently evident that he was seldom persuaded that his papers were improved. Amid all this we see in the Diary many exhibitions of vexation. One day he acknowledges, "I cannot always restrain the irritability of my temper;" another day he informed his colleagues, "with too much warmth, that they might be assured I was as determined as they wer

of meeting them upon that ground. Mr. Adams, never lacking in courage, actually wished to argue with them that it would be for the interests of Great Britain not less than of the United States if Canada should be ceded to the latter power. Unfortunately his colleagues would not support him in this aud

rms were of frequent occurrence, even almost to the very day of agreement. On September 15, at a dinner given by the American Commissioners, Lord Gambier asked Mr. Adams whether he would return immediately to St. Petersburg. "Yes," replied Mr. Adams, "that is, if you send us away." His lordship "replied with assurances how deeply he lamented it, and with a hope that we should one day be friends again." On the same occasion Mr. Goulburn said that probably the last note of the Americans would "terminate the business," and that they "must fight it out." Fighting it out was a much less painful prospect for G

red to take on me the responsibility of trespassing upon their instructions thus far. Not only so, but I would at this moment cheerfully give

icating alleged rights. But that Mr. Adams correctly read the wishes of the government was proved within a very few days by the receipt of express authority from home "to conclude the peace on the basis of the status ante bellum." Three days afterwards, on November 27, three and a half month

ng fish upon a desert," as he was pleased to describe a right for which the United States has often been ready to go to war and may yet some time do so. "Mr. Clay lost his temper," writes Mr. Adams a day or two later, "as he generally does whenever this right of the British to navigate the Mississippi is discussed. He was utterly averse to admitting it as an equivalent for a stipulation securing the contested part of the fisheries. He said the more he heard of this [the right of fishing], the more convinced he was that it was of little or no value. He should be glad to get it if he could, but he was sure the British would not ultimately grant it. That the navigation of the Mississippi, on the other hand, was an object of immense importance, and he could see no sort of reason for granting it as an equivalent for the fisheries." Thus spoke the representative of the West. The New Englander-the son of the man whose exertions had been chiefly instrumental in originally obtaining the

r an exceedingly quarrelsome conference, he records his belief that the British have "insidiously kept open" two points, "for the sake of finally

hich he uses." Mr. Bayard referred to the case of the Falkland Islands. "'Why' (in a transport of rage), said Goulburn, 'in that case we sent a fleet and troops and drove the fellows off; and that is what we ought to have done in this case.'" Mr. J. Q. Adams, whose extensive and accurate information more than once annoyed his adversaries, stated that, as he remembered it, "the Spaniards in that case had driven the British off,"-and Lord Gambier helped his blundering colleague out of the difficulty by suggesting a new subject, much as the defeated heroes of the Iliad used to find happy refuge from death in a god-sent cloud of dust. It is amusing to read that in the midst of such scenes as these the show of courtesy was still maintained; and on December 13 the Americans "all dined with the British Plenipotentiaries," though "the party was more than usually dull, stiff, and reserved." It was certainly forcing the spirit of good fellowship. The next day Mr. Clay notified his colleagues that they were going "to make a damned bad treaty, and he did

n was largely due to what had been going on in the English Cabinet. At the outset Lord Castlereagh had been very unwilling to conclude peace, and his disposition had found expression in the original intolerable terms prepared by the British Commissioners. But Lord Liverpool had been equally solicitous on the other side, and was said even to have tendered his resignation to the Prince Regent, if an accommodation shou

f the many subjects mooted between the negotiators scarcely any had survived the fierce contests which had been waged concerning them. The whole matter of the navigation of the Mississippi, access to that river, and a road through American territory, had been dropped by the British; while the Americans had been well content to say nothing of the Northeastern fisheries, which they regarded as still their own. The disarmament on the lakes and along the Canadian border, and the neutralization of a strip of Indian territory, were yielded by the English. The Americans were content to have nothing said about i

event could have reached the ears of the insolent Englishmen at Ghent, who had for three months been enjoying the malicious pleasure of lending to the Americans English newspapers containing accounts of American misfortunes. But that fortunate battle was not fought until a few days after the eight Commissioners had signed their compact. It is an interesting illustration of the slowness of communication which our forefathers had to endure, that the treaty crossed the Atlantic in a sailing ship in time to travel through much of the country simultaneously with the report of this farewell victory. Two such good pieces of news coming together set the people wild with delight. Even on the dry pages of Niles's "Weekly Register" occurs the triumphant paragraph: "Who would not be an American? Long live the Republic! All hail! last asylum of oppressed humanity! Peace is signed in the arms of victory!" It was natural that most of the ecstasy should be manifested concerning the military triumph, and that the mass of the people should find more pleasure in glorifying General Ja

Plenipotentiary to Great Britain. His first duty was, in connection with Mr. Clay and Mr. Gallatin, to negotiate a treaty of commerce, in which business he again met the same three British Commissioners by whom the negotiations at Ghent had been conducted, of whose abilities the government appeared to entertain a better opinion than the Marquis of Wellesley had express

o insult. He remarks of Castlereagh, after one of his first interviews with that nobleman: "His deportment is sufficiently graceful, and his person is handsome. His manner was cold, but not absolutely repulsive." Before he left he had the pleasure of having Mr. Canning specially seek acquaintance with him. He met, of course, many distinguished and many agreeable persons during his residence, and partook of many festivities, especially of numerous civic banquets at which toasts were formally given in the dullest English fashion and he was obliged to display his capacity for "table-cloth oratory," as he called it, more than was agreeable to him. He was greatly bored by these solemn and pompous feedings. Partly in order to escape them he took a house at Ealing

honorable diplomatic career, and bidding his last farewell to Europe. He returned home to take the post of