the negotiations at week. 
6 i 
mined to go through with it; and to give as little opportunity as can be 
helped to those who hate the work to revile the master workman.”* 
In spite, therefore, of the nature of the instructions last sent to 
Malmesbury, Pitt still proposed to fulfil his original intentions, and 
waited only for that lowering of the demands of France, of which he 
felt confident, to reimpose his authority upon the English Cabinet. 
Whatever the wavering of his fellow-ministers, Pitt himself had not as 
yet yielded his belief in the necessity of peace or increased the limited 
concessions he was prepared to ask from France. Outwardly the rela¬ 
tions of Pitt and Grenville rested upon their customary basis of cordial 
cooperation; in reality they were in opposition, and their intercourse 
lacked that friendly character which had formerly constituted so large 
a part of Grenville’s influence. 
England’s refusal to acquiesce in the French demands was presented 
by Malmesbury at Eille on July 25, and upon its becoming evident that 
France would not abate one jot of her pretensions, the negotiation stood 
in danger of coming to a full stop and even to a rupture ; but in these 
circumstances Maret, one of the three French diplomats at Lille, acting 
through a friend, Pein, who entered into friendly conferences with the 
English secretary of the mission, George Ellis, sought and arrived at 
a private understanding with Malmesbury. Maret explained that no 
further proposals could be made by the French representatives at Lille 
until the issue of a bitter conflict then secretly waging in the gov¬ 
ernment at Paris was clear. Of the five members of the Directory, 
Barras, Rewbell, and Larevelliere-Lepeaux, aided by the Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, Delacroix, were opposed to peace. The two remain¬ 
ing members, Carnot and Barthelemy, supported by a majority of the 
Councils, were in favor of a fair arrangement with England, and, if in 
the result this party should gain the control of affairs, Maret believed 
that pressure would be put on Holland to force an acquiescence in tpe 
cession of some, if not all, of the colonies captured by England during 
the progress of the war.f Maret also stated that the first move of the 
Carnot party would be the substitution of Talleyrand for Delacroix 
* Canning to Ellis, July 27, 1797. Malmesbury, III, 437. 
t Ernouf, the author of Maret , Due de Bassano , makes no reference to the secret 
portion of Maret’s labors at Eille, yet the book was published after the Malmes¬ 
bury diary. Sybel also passes over this feature in silence, though giving as a 
principal foot-note reference “ Malmesbury, III.” Maret’s honest desire for peace 
is unquestioned, for it is proved by his letter to Barras urging that policy (in Maret , 
Due de Bassano ), and also by Barras’s dislike and suspicion of Maret (Barras, II, 
263). Barras’s Memoirs at this period are concerned chiefly with the details of the 
struggle in Paris and touch but incidentally on foreign affairs, but where these are 
mentioned they show that the Directory had no thought of making peace on any 
terms, and was in fact displeased with the attitude of its representatives at Eille. 
