tions with respect to the non-failure of any application for foreign loans, excited great and (excepting his colleagues or rather Mr. ARNOLD) universal indignation and astonishment in Congress; and he was repeatedly premonished of the certain ruin in which he would thereby involve his character and consequence; and of the necessity which Congress would be laid under, of vindicating themselves by some act which would expose and condemn him to all the world.

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 19TH.

See Journals.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 20TH.

A motion was made by Mr. HAMILTON for revising the requisitions of the preceding and present years, in order to reduce them more within the faculties of the States. In support of the motion it was urged, that the exorbitancy of the demands produced a despair of fulfilling them, which benumbed the efforts for that purpose. On the other side, it was alleged that a relaxation of the demand would be followed by a relaxation of the efforts; that unless other resources were substituted, either the States would be deluded by such a measure into false expectations, or, in case the truth should be disclosed to prevent that effect, that the enemy would be encouraged to persevere in the war VOL. I.-15*

against us. The motion meeting with little patronage, it was withdrawn.

The report of the Committee on the motion of Mr. HAMILTON proposed that the Secretary of Congress should transmit to the Executive of Rhode Island the several acts of Congress, with a state of foreign loans. The object of the Committee was, that in case Rhode Island should abet or not resent the misconduct of their Representative, as would most likely be the event, Congress should commit themselves as little as possible in the mode of referring it to that State. When the report came under consideration it was observed, that the President had always transmitted acts of Congress to the Executives of the States, and that such a change, on the present occasion, might afford a pretext, if not excite a disposition, in Rhode Island not to vindicate the honor of Congress. The matter was compromised by substituting the "Secretary of Foreign Affairs, who, ex officio, corresponds with the Governors, &c., within whose department the facts to be transmitted, as to foreign loans, lay." No motion or vote opposed the report as it passed."

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 21ST.

The Committee to confer with Mr. LIVINGSTON was appointed the preceding day, in consequence of the unwillingness of several States to elect either General SCHUYLER, Mr. CLYMER, or Mr. READ, the gentlemen previously put into nomination, and of a hint

that Mr. LIVINGSTON might be prevailed on to serve till the spring. The Committee found him in this disposition, and their report was agreed to without opposition. See the Journal.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 23RD.

The motion to strike out the words "accruing to the United States," was grounded on a denial of the principle that a capture and possession by the enemy of moveable property extinguished or affected the title of the owners. On the other side, this principle was asserted as laid down by the best writers, and conformable to the practice of all nations; to which was added, that if a contrary doctrine were established by Congress, innumerable claims would be brought forward by those whose property had, on recapture, been applied to the public use. See Journal.

Letters were this day received from Dr. Franklin, Mr. Jay and the Marquis de la Fayette. They were dated the fourteenth of October. That from the first enclosed a copy of the second commission to Mr. Oswald, with sundry preliminary articles, and distrusted the British Court. That from the second expressed great jealousy of the French Government, and referred to an intercepted letter from Mr. Marbois, opposing the claim of the United States to the fisheries. This despatch produced much indignation against the author of the intercepted letter, and visible emotions in some against

France. It was remarked here that our Ministers took no notice of the distinct commissions to Fitzherbert and Oswald; that although on a supposed intimacy, and joined in the same commission, they, the Ministers, wrote separately, and breathed opposite sentiments as to the views of France. Mr. LivINGSTON told me that the letter of the Count de Vergennes, as read to him by the Chevalier Luzerne, very delicately mentioned and complained that the American Ministers did not, in the negotiations with the British Ministers, maintain the due communication with those of France. Mr. LIVINGSTON inferred, on the whole, that France was sincerely anxious for peace.

The President acquainted Congress that Count Rochambeau had communicated the intended embarkation of the French troops for the West Indies, with an assurance from the King of France, that, in case the war should be renewed, they should immediately be sent back.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 24TH.

The letter from Mr. Jay, enclosing a copy of the intercepted letter from Marbois, was laid before Congress. The tenor of it, with the comments of Mr. Jay, affected deeply the sentiments of Congress with regard to France. The policy, in particular manifested by France, of keeping us tractable by leaving the British in possession of posts in this country, awakened strong jealousies, corroborated

the charges on that subject, and with concomitant circumstances may engender the opposite extreme of the gratitude and cordiality now felt towards France; as the closest friends in a rupture are apt to become the bitterest foes. Much will depend, however, on the course pursued by Britain. The liberal one Oswald seems to be pursuing will much promote an alienation of temper in America from France. It is not improbable that the intercepted letter from Marbois came through Oswald's hands. If Great Britain, therefore, yields the fisheries and the back territory, America will feel the obligation to her, not to France, who appears to be illiberal as to the first, and favorable to Spain as to the second, object; and, consequently, has forfeited the confidence of the States interested in either of them. Candor will suggest, however, that the situation of France is and has been extremely perplexing. The object of her blood and money was not only the independence, but the commerce and gratitude of America; the commerce to render independence the more useful, the gratitude to render that commerce the more permanent. It was necessary, therefore, she supposed, that America should be exposed to the cruelties of her enemies, and be made sensible of her own weakness, in order to be grateful to the hand that relieved her. This policy, if discovered, tended, on the other hand, to spoil the whole. Experience shows that her truest policy would have been to relieve America by the most direct and generous means, and to have mingled with them no artifice whatever. With respect to Spain, also, the situation of France has been as peculiarly deli