igS Transactions of the Royal Canadian Institute [vol. x 



Jay's Treaty was received in the United States with execration by the 

 party which was favourable to France and which was powerful in the 

 House of Representatives. Jay was charged with selling his country, 

 and was even burned in effigy. Rochefoucault, who travelled through 

 the United States at the time, speaks of the hatred against Britain of the 

 Americans and their confidence that the President (Washington) would 

 not be hoodwinked into approving the Treaty. Washington waited long 

 before ratifying the Treaty, and when at length he did so, after a secret 

 vote by the Senate, he lost much of his popularity and was joined with 

 Jay in the curses of a whole political party. This extraordinary out- 

 break of popular malevolence prevented Jay from obtaining the prize 

 upon which he had set his heart — the Presidency. But time brings about 

 its revenges; the Treaty which made him the best hated man of his time 

 is now his highest title to immortality. It should be added that not- 

 withstanding the feeling against it when it was negotiated, there was 

 never any popular complaint against the results of the arbitrations 

 provided for in the Treaty. 



The war between France and Britain continued to do its evil work 

 indirectly as well as directly. Britain was compelled to rely upon her 

 navy for her very existence, and she could not get enough sailors to man 

 it voluntarily. It is a part of the common law of England, as of all 

 civilised countries, that his country has a right to call upon every man 

 to defend it. It was, and is, law that every British subject may in case 

 of need be forced into the navy as a sailor ; hence the press gang with all 

 its horrors. Again, by the common law of England — and by Magna 

 Charta — no man may put off his allegiance. Many British subjects 

 had joined American ships and some of these were become American 

 citizens. Britain claimed the right of seizing these whenever she found 

 them. The United States admitted that she might take them if she 

 found them in her own waters; Britain admitted that she had no right 

 to take them in American waters; the dispute was as to the high seas. 

 Britain said: "The high seas are no man's land, therefore I violate no 

 other nation's territory by seizing my subjects off American ships there". 

 The United States said: "No man's land, and therefore my flag makes it 

 mine for the time being." Britain had the power and she continually 

 seized her subjects, former and present, on American ships on the high 

 seas. 



Probably this would not have been so much objected to; but the 

 British commanders went further. They impressed hundreds of Ameri- 

 can citizens, claiming them to be British. Sometimes, perhaps, this was 

 by mistake, it is too much to think it was always so. The captains had 

 to have men, and they themselves were only men, and men to whom the 

 salvation of their country was paramount to every other consideration. 



