332 THE CONCILIATION PROPOSALS CHAP. 



might expect almost any honour or place if he succeeded, 

 he roused only disgust in the American's mind : " they 

 would give me a place," he said, " in a cart to Tyburn." 

 " There could be no agreement while parliament claimed 

 the power of altering our constitution." Some one stated 

 that Britain could easily burn the seaport towns : so 

 indeed she could, replied Franklin, but it would not alter 

 the resolution of the Americans. " Take care what you 

 do," he cried, " you will have to repay damages with 

 interest." Fothergill smiled, not without some approval 

 of these passionate words, and said he would repeat them 

 to-morrow to Lord Dartmouth. The paper of " Revised 

 Hints " (Appendix A, No. IV.) may have been drawn up 

 at this conference or soon afterwards, but it opened a 

 slender prospect of agreement. Hyde writes to Barclay 

 on the following day : " Your letter, my good friend, 

 raises surprise and concern : the light I saw is obscured, 

 great hopes are baffled." The rubs must be " mollified 

 by submission." 



On February 6 Fothergill wrote as follows to Lord 

 Dartmouth announcing the failure of the negotiation. 

 The text of the letter seems to have been the subject of 

 careful revision by Barclay and himself : 



I wish it had been in my power to have informed my noble 

 friend that our negotiation had been successful. But it is 

 not. And this not owing to want of attention or willingness 

 [in] my friend or me to promote a reconciliation ; nor to any 

 opposition or refractory disposition in Dr. Franklin. Our 

 difficulties arose from the American acts, viz. the Boston 

 Port Bill, the Government of the Massachusetts & the 

 Quebec Acts. As a concession to pay a tax was the sine qua 

 non on this side ; so a rescinding of those acts, or rather 

 repealing them, is the terms of reconciliation on the other. 



As we had not permission to give any hopes that these 

 acts would be repealed, to ask for anything else, however 

 easily consented to here, would not be satisfactory on the 

 other side. And therefore an assembly of delegates authorized 

 to treat upon the means of establishing a good understanding 

 between the parties at variance, without first removing this 

 obstacle, would be wholly ineffectual. We found that the 

 delegates to the late Congress were chosen in the respective 



