123 



t^r, wHttcn solely for the vindication of my own conduct, to tho^e. 

 to vvhoml WHS immediately responsible, was asked of me, by a per- 

 son known to be under the orders of the Secretary of State, for the 

 purpose of presenting it (o the public, a tribunal for which it had 

 never been intended, and to which it ought not to have been pre- 

 sented without my consent. I certainly did believe, that 1 was 

 permitted to make those corrections of the copy in possession, 

 which appeared to me to be proper to exhibit my case most advan- 

 tageously before that tribunal. I the more confidently entertained 

 this opinion, as the paper was not to be there exhibited without the 

 previous examination and consent of the adverse party. Such were 

 the views with which it was unreservedly contided to Mr. Adams. 

 Out he communicated my private letter, as the paper called for, 

 and, \vith it, he disingenuously communicated the paper, entrusted 

 to him, not as the paper ca'led for, but as a convenient vehicle for 

 passionate invective and intemperate personal abuse against me. 

 If justice, or even decency towards me, presented no obstacle, 

 sfill, I should have believed, that a respect tor the Representatives 

 of the people of the United States, would have at least been suffi- 

 cient to have deterred him from so rude and irregular a course of 

 proceeding. 



His first remark on what he ostentatiously presents as a duplicate 

 is, that the letter written at Paris, "• although of the same general 

 purport and tenor, with the so-called duplicate, differs from it in 

 several highly significant passages." He presents, as an example, 

 a parallel extracted from the two papers. He deduces from this 

 parallel, the contradiction that I did believe, in the one paper, and 

 that I did not believe, in the other paper, that we were permitted, 

 by our instructions, at Ghent, to offer a stipulation for the naviga- 

 tion, by the British, of the Mississippi. So tar however, from the 

 parallel passages exhibiting such a contradiction, they contain 

 wilhin tliemseives the evidence of their consistency with each 

 olher. 



The original letter refers exclusively to the instructions of the 

 2b{\\ of June, 1814, (a) on v»'hich the majority, in the despatch of 

 the 25th of December, of tlie same year, solely relied, when they 

 said, " our instructions had forbidden us to sutler our right to the 

 fisheries to be brought into discussion, and had not authorized us to 

 make any distinction in the several provisions of the 3d article of 

 the treaty of 1783/' 



fa) Extract of a letter of insfrurtmiSy received from the Secretary hy the Com- 

 missio7Lers at Ghent, datedlbtJi, of June^ 1814. 

 ^^ Informaiion has hecn received, from a quarter deserving atterUion, that the 

 kite events in France have produced such an effect on the British government, as 

 (omake it probable that a demand will be made at Golhtnburgh to surrender our 

 right to thejisheries, to abandon all trade beyond the Cape of Good Hope, and to 

 cede Louisiana to Spai/n. Ji c cannot believe that such a demand wUt be made ; 

 flwuld itbe, youuill,ofcovrsc, treat it as it deserves. These rights tnnit not be 

 pinight into disrtission. M insister] on. yonr negotiations wj]] cease.''' 



