READJUSTMENT AFTER WAR 19 



ment, and his success in accomplishing this was 

 understood to be the condition of his future 

 advancement in his diplomatic career. He did 

 not anticipate much pleasure from his task. 

 He was an intimate of George Canning, whose 

 antipathy to Castlereagh and all his works made 

 much scandal in the circles of the ruling aris 

 tocracy. &quot;Your plan of treatment,&quot; wrote 

 Canning to Bagot just after his appointment 

 in 1815, &quot;may or may not succeed with the 

 Yankees, but it is obviously, for your sake, 

 the proper one. I am afraid, indeed, that the 

 question is not so much how you will treat them 

 as how they will treat you, and that the hard 

 est lesson which a British Minister has to learn 

 in America is not what to do, but what to bear. 

 But even this may come round. And Waterloo 

 is a great help to you, perhaps a necessary help 

 after the (to say the least) balanced successes 

 and misfortunes of the American war.&quot; 



Despite all the obstacles, however, Bagot suc 

 ceeded in his undertaking. Though he was 

 fully impressed with the fact that ill feeling 

 toward Great Britain was a controlling influence 

 in the predominant party in the country, he was 

 tactful and far-sighted enough to establish at 

 Washington the same official cordiality that 



