very feeling which the mode of expressing that
dissatisfaction was calculated to produce, and without waiting for
instructions I hastened on my own responsibility to make a communication
to your predecessor in office on the subject. In this, under the reserve
that the President could not be called on for an explanation, I did
in fact give one that I thought would have removed all injurious
impressions.

This is the first of the fortunate circumstances to which I have
alluded--fortunate in being made before any demand implying a right to
require it; fortunate in its containing, without any knowledge of the
precise parts of the message which gave offense, answers to all that
have since come to my knowledge. I can easily conceive that the
communication of which I speak, made, as I expressly stated, without
previous authority from my Government, might not have had the effect
which its matter was intended to produce, but it has since (as I have
now the honor to inform your excellency) received from the President his
full and unqualified approbation; but it is necessary to add that this
was given before he had any intimation of an intention to attach it
as a condition to the payment of the indemnity due by the treaty, given
not only when he was ignorant of any such intent, but when he was
informed by France that she intended to execute the treaty and saw by
the law which was introduced that it was not to be fettered by any such
condition. Thus that is already done by a voluntary act which could not
have been done when required as a right, still less when made, what will
unquestionably in the United States be considered degrading, as a
condition. At this time, sir, I would for no consideration enter into
the details I then did. If I could now so far forget what under present
circumstances would be due to the dignity of my country, I should be
disavowed, and deservedly disavowed, by the President. It is happy,
therefore, I repeat, that the good feeling of my country was evinced in
the manner I have stated at the only time when it could be done with
honor; and though present circumstances would forbid my making the
communication I then did, they do not prevent my referring to it for
the purpose of shewing that it contains, as I have stated it does,
everything that ought to have been satisfactory. Actual circumstances
enable me to do this now. Future events, which I need not explain, may
hereafter render it improper, and it may b