6i6 A. D. 1778. 



to the other, provided no other ration fliould have the indulgence, 

 which they hereby agreed to withhold from each-other. 



10) The French were to retain all the rights to the Newfoundland 

 filLery, conferred upon them by the treaties of Utrecht and Paris. 



11) The fubjeds of either power were to enjoy all the privileges of 

 fubjedls, and be exempted from the burthens impofed upon aliens, in 

 the dominions of the other. 



29) Either pov/cr had the right of maintaining confuls, vice-confuls, 

 agents and commiflaries in the ports of the other. 



30) The king of France promifed to allow the Americans one or 

 more free ports in Europe, to which they might bring all the commo- 

 dities of the thirteen ftates, and alfo the free ports already opened in 

 his Weft-India iflands. 



The other articles are filled with regulations for the examination of 

 vefTels bound to the ports of powers at war with either of the contrad- 

 ing powers, and for pafTports to proted; their veflels in cafe of fuch a 

 war, an enumeration of the goods to be confidered as contraband and 

 liable to confifcation, regulations for prizes taken by the cruifers of 

 either power, for the treatment of wrecked vefTels, &c. 



By the other treaty it was provided, that ' in cafe Great Britain in 

 ' refentment of that connection and good correfpondence, which is the 



* objed of the faid treaty [of commerce] ftiould break the peace with 

 ' France, either by dired hoftilities, or by hindering her commerce 



* and navigation,' his Majefty and the United ftates fliould make it a 

 common caufe, and aid each-other with their councils and forces, in 

 order to maintain effedually the abfolute and unlimited independ- 

 ence and fovereignty of the United ftates. The northern parts of Ame- 

 rica and the Bermuda iflands, if conquered by the allied powers, were 

 to be annexed to the United ftates ; and any of the iflands in, or near, 

 the Gulf of Mexico, to be taken from Great Britain, were to belong to 

 France. Neither party was to make peace without firft obtaining the 

 confent of the other, nor without an exprefs acknowlegement from 

 Great Britain of the independence of the United ftates. And both 

 agreed to fulfil the conditions of the treaty without any claim for com- 

 penfation on either fide, and to admit into the alliance any other 

 powers, who might have received injuries from England. Such were 

 the firft of the treaties between powers feparated by the Atlantic ocean ; 

 treaties, which were in a fliort time to I'pread the flames of war from 

 America to every quarter of the globe. 



March 1 3'" — The French government, having now decifively chofen 

 their ground, in a few weeks lent a declaration to the Britifli court, giving 

 notice of the treaty of friendfliip and commerce with the United ftates of 

 America, but without faying a word of the treaty of alliance ; profefling, 

 neverthelefs, a determination to cultivate the good underftanding fub- 



