110 



perfect and undoubting reliance, that to the clear-sighted intelligence 

 of the western county, the gorgons, and hydras, and chimeras dire, 

 of vir. Russell's imagination, raised by incantation from the waters 

 of the Mississippi, will sink as they rose, and be seen no more. 

 Without professing to sacrifice any of those ties of duty and alle- 

 giance, which bind me to the interests of my native State, I cannot 

 allow Mr. Russell's claim to a special ardour for the welfare of the 

 West» to be superior to my own, or to that of the deceased, or of 

 the living colleague, with whom I concurred, without mental re- 

 servation, in the measure subscribed to, and denounced b3\ Mr. 

 Russell We were all the ministers of the whole Union ; and 

 sure I am, that every member of the majority would have spurned 

 with equal disdain the idea of sacrificing the interest of any one 

 part of the Union to that of any other, and the uncandid purpose 

 of awakening suspicions at the source of their common authori- 

 ty here, against the patriotism and integrity of any one of his col- 

 leagues. 



I shall conclude with a passing notice of the three alternatives, 

 which in the postscript to the original of his letter of 1 1th Februa- 

 ry, 1815, he says, we might have taken, instead of that which, as 

 he alleges, vv^e, against his will, did do. We had, says he, three 

 other ways of proceeding : 



" First. To contend for the indestructibility of the treaty of 1783, 

 '* thence inferring the continuance of the fishing privilege, without 

 ** saying any thing about the navigation of the Mississippi, which 

 ** would have reserved our right of contesting this navigation, on 

 ** the grounds I have mentioned, specially applicable to it. Se- 

 '* condly, To have considered the treaty at an end, and offered a 

 *' reasonable equivalent, wherever it might be found, for the fishing 

 *' privilege." Thirdly, To have made this liberty a sine qua non 

 ** of peace, as embraced by the principle of status ante bellum. 



*' To either of these propositions" (he adds,) " I would have as- 

 ** sented. But I could not consent to grant or revive the British 

 ** right to the navigation of the Mississippi." 



He could not consent ! He did consent : see his name subscribed 

 to the letter from the American to the British plenipotentiaries of 

 12th December, 1814 — p. 44 of the message of 25th February 

 last. 



It is, indeed, painful to remark here, and throughout this letter 

 of Mr. Russell, how little solicitude there is discoverable, to pre- 

 serve even the appearance of any coincidence between his real 

 sentiments and his professions : half his letter is an argument in 

 form to prove, that the treaty o*' 1783 was abrogated by the war ; 

 yet, he says, he would have assented to contend for its indestruc- 

 tibility^ so long as it applied only to the defence of the fisheries, 

 reserving his special grounds of objection to its being applied to 

 the navigation of the Mississippi. I have shown, that the inde- 

 structibility of the treaty of 1783 never was asserted by any of the 

 American commissioners ; but, that the principle that it had not 



