1824.] NEGOTIATION AT LONDON. 337 



more was done on the subject during that session ; the papers, 

 however, were both published, and they immediately attracted the 

 attention of the British ministry. In a conference held at London, 

 in July following, between the American envoy, Mr. Rush, and the 

 British commissioners, Messrs. Huskisson and Stratford Canning, 

 the latter gentlemen commented upon the observations of General 

 Jesup, particularly upon those respecting the removal of British 

 traders from the territories of the Columbia, which, they said, " were 

 calculated to put Great Britain especially upon her guard, appear- 

 ing, as they did, at a moment when a friendly negotiation was 

 pending between the two powers for the adjustment of their relative 

 and conflicting claims to that entire district of country." 



It is moreover certain, from the accounts of Mr. Rush, as well as 

 from those given subsequently by Mr. Gallatin, that the publication 

 of General Jesup's letter, and the declaration in President Monroe's 

 message against the establishment of European colonies in America, 

 rendered the British government much less disposed to any con- 

 cession, with regard to the north-west territories, than it would 

 otherwise have been ; and there is reason to believe, from many 

 circumstances, that they tended materially to produce a union of 

 views, approaching to a league, between that power and Russia, 

 which has proved very disadvantageous to the interests of the 

 United States on the North Pacific coasts. 



The negotiation respecting the north-west coasts of America, 

 commenced at London in April, 1824, was not long continued; 

 the parties being so entirely at variance with regard to facts as well 

 as principles, that the impossibility of effecting any new arrange- 

 ment soon became evident. Mr. Rush,* the American plenipoten- 

 tiary, began by claiming for the United States the exclusive pos- 

 session and sovereignty of the whole country west of the Rocky 

 Mountains, from the 42d degree of latitude, at least as far north 

 as the 51st, between which parallels all the waters of the Columbia 

 were then supposed to be included. In support of this claim, he 

 cited, as in 1818, the facts — of the first discovery of the Columbia 

 by Gray — of the first exploration of that river from its sources to the 

 sea by Lewis and Clarke — of the first settlement on its banks by 

 the Pacific Fur Company, " a settlement which was reduced by 

 the arms of the British during the late war, but was formally sur- 



* Letter from Mr. Rush to the secretary of state, of August 12th, 1824, among the 

 documents accompanying President Adams's message to Congress of January 31st, 



43 £*M J** Sua. Vjh(. N } it>,T. 



