y his ships of war, before the
declaration of war against the United States. And it is
further agreed that his Britannic Majesty will also
earnestly recommend it to his Parliament to make
compensation for all the towns, villages and farms, burnt
and destroyed by his troops, or adherents in these United
States."

The three British commissioners were confounded by these counter
demands, and said not another word about reimbursing the American
Tories. On the 30th of November, 1782, the preliminaries were signed,
subject to the assent of the French ministers, who were also to submit
their preliminaries to the American envoys. By these articles: 1. The
boundaries were established. 2. The Americans could fish on the banks
of Newfoundland, and cure their fish on the unsettled shores of Nova
Scotia and Labrador. 3. Congress was to recommend to the several
States, to restore the confiscated property of real British subjects.
4. Private debts were to be paid. 5. There were to be no more
confiscations or prosecutions, on either side, for acts during the
war. 6. The British troops were to be withdrawn. 7. The navigation of
the Mississippi was declared to be free. 8. And any place captured,
after the signing of these articles, was to be restored.

On the 13th of January, Count de Vergennes, and the British minister
Mr. Fitzherbert, signed their preliminaries in the presence of Dr.
Franklin and Mr. Adams. Not till then did the English order
hostilities to be suspended, and declare the senseless war to be at an
end.

There was universal satisfaction in America. With the exception of the
king and a few of his ministers, there was general satisfaction in
England. It is true that the national pride was sorely humiliated. But
after all these woes which England had inflicted upon America, her own
statesmen, with almost undivided voice, declared that the interests of
both nations were alike promoted, by having a few feeble colonies
elevated into the rich and flourishing republic of the United States.
Thus the war of the American revolution must be pronounced to have
been, on the part of England, which forced it, one of the most
disastrous and senseless of those blunders which have ever accompanied
the progress of our race.[38]

[Footnote 38: Contemplate the still greater blunder of our civil war.
It was forced upon the nation by the slave traders, that they might
_perpetuate slavery_. And now after the in