Russell, the _charge d'affaires_ in London when hostilities began. To
use the expression of Monroe, then Secretary of State, "At the moment
of the declaration of war, the President, regretting the necessity
which produced it, looked to its termination, and provided for
it."[473] The two concessions required as indispensable, in the
overture thus referred to, dated June 26, 1812, were the revocation of
the Orders in Council, and the abandonment of the practice of
impressing from American merchant ships. Should these preliminary
conditions be obtained, Russell was authorized to stipulate an
armistice, during which the two countries should enter upon
negotiations, to be conducted either at Washington or in London, for
the settlement of all points of difference.

Russell made this communication to Castlereagh August 24, 1812. Before
this date Admiral Warren had sailed from England for the American
command, carrying with him the propositions of the British Government
for a suspension of hostilities, consequent upon the repeal of the
Orders in Council.[474] In view of Warren's mission, and of the fact
that Russell had no powers to negotiate, but merely to conclude an
arrangement upon terms which he could not alter, and which his
Government had laid down in ignorance of the revocation of the Orders,
Castlereagh declined to discuss with him the American requirements. "I
cannot, however," he wrote, "refrain on one single point from
expressing my surprise, namely, that as a condition preliminary even
to a suspension of hostilities, the Government of the United States
should have thought fit to demand that the British Government should
desist from its ancient and accustomed practice of impressing British
seamen from the merchant ships of a foreign state, simply on the
assurance that a law shall hereafter be passed to prohibit the
employment of British seamen in the public or commercial service of
that state."[475] "The Government could not consent to suspend the
exercise of a right upon which the naval strength of the empire mainly
depends," until fully convinced that the object would be assured by
other means. To a subsequent modification of the American
propositions, in form, though not in tenor, the British minister
replied in the same spirit, throwing the weight of his objections upon
the question of impressment, which indeed remained alone of the two
causes of rupture.[476]

Commendable as was its desire for peace, the Ame