DOCUMENTS BEARING ON TBEATY OF 1783. 49 



No. 13. 178%, February 19: Extract from letter, United States Secre- 

 tary of State (Mr. Livingston} to the Governors of the various 

 States. 



.... It is an undeniable fact that Britain has not, in the course 

 of the last campaign, gained any advantage of her enemies, but, on 

 the contrary, has seen their fleets ride triumphant in the seas she 

 proudly called her own, and an army in which she placed her fondest 

 hopes made captive. But, on the other hand, we are compelled to 

 admit that she has met with no such reverse of fortune as materially 

 to debilitate her or weaken her resources for another campaign. Her 

 trade has, for the most part, returned in safety. Her fleets have 

 blocked up those of the Dutch, and, upon the separation of the com- 

 bined fleets, recovered the superiority in the European seas. The 

 army taken in America is only so far decidedly ruinous to her affairs 

 here as we know how to avail ourselves of the advantage it affords. 



That her pride is not humbled, that she did not wish for peace 

 prior to this advantage is obvious, 1st, from her refusing to make a 

 separate treaty with the Dutch, who, under the mediation of the 

 Empress of Eussia, seemed anxiously to wish it ; 2dly, from her neg- 

 lect to notice the last proposals of the mediating powers, which yet 

 remain unanswered; so that if any alteration is made in their senti- 

 ments on this subject they must originate in their ill success in 

 America, for in every other quarter their defensive war seems to have 

 been supported with advantage. How far this will operate admits 

 of a doubt which prudence directs us not to rely upon. Money, the 

 great support of modern wars, has been raised with more facility in 

 England than in any country in the world ; and we find the minority 

 last year censuring Lord North for giving the advantage of lending 

 to his friends. Their losses may indeed render subscriptions more 

 expensive to the public, but there is no well-grounded room to sup- 

 pose they will not fill up, and still less reason to believe, if the means 

 for carrying on the war are attainable, that the vindictive spirit of 

 the king and his ministry and the overweening pride of the nation 

 will soon yield to make a peace which involves their disgrace and 

 humiliation. But as strength or weakness are mere comparative 

 terms, we can form no judgment of the measures of Britain but by 

 attending to the force and disposition of her enemies. 



The United Provinces are evidently dragged into the war, and have 

 prosecuted it as if they momentarily expected a peace. The 

 31 colonies in the West Indies have been taken without being in a 

 state to make the smallest resistance, and the active interposi- 

 tion of France alone saved those in the east from sharing the same 

 fate. Our last letters from Holland place the distress of their com- 

 merce in a strong point of view. They are unhappily rent by parties 

 which clog the wheels of Government, though it is said the party 

 opposed to England are the most numerous and growing in strength, 

 so that at some future day we may reasonably hope they will assume 

 the entire ascendency ; yet we can build very little on this till the close 

 of another year. This much is certain, they are not yet allied to us, 

 nor have they given us reason to believe that they intend to be so. 

 They wish for peace, and will take no measures that can obstruct it. 

 They have lent us no money, nor are they likely to do it ; from whence 



