of England to be injurious to France. I do not,
however, mention it from a wish to embarrass the negociation for peace.
The Directory has fixed its _ultimatum_; but if that ultimatum be
rejected, the obligation to adhere to it is discharged, and a new one
may be assumed. So wretchedly has Pitt managed his opportunities" that
every succeeding negociation has ended in terms more against him than
the former. If the Directory had bribed him, he could not serve his
interest better than he does. He serves it as Lord North served that of
America, which finished in the discharge of his master.*

1 Marquis de Barthelemy (Francois) (1750-1830) entered the
Directory in June, 1796, through royalist influence. He
shared Pichegru's banishment, and subsequently became an
agent of Louis XVIII.--_Editor._

* The father of Pitt, when a member of the House of Commons,
exclaiming one day, during a former war, against the
enormous and ruinous expense of German connections, as the
offspring of the Hanover succession, and borrowing a
metaphor from the story of Prometheus, cried out: "Thus,
Hie Prometheus, is Britain chained to the barren rock of
Hanover; whilst the imperial eagle preys upon her vitals."--
Author.

Thus far I had written when the negociation at Lille became suspended,
in consequence of which I delayed the publication, that the ideas
suggested in this letter might not intrude themselves during the
interval. The _ultimatum_ offered by the Directory, as the terms of
peace, was more moderate than the government of England had a right to
expect. That government, though the provoker of the war, and the first
that committed hostilities by sending away the ambassador Chauvelin,(**)
had formerly talked of demanding from France, _indemnification for
the past and security for the future_. France, in her turn, might have
retorted, and demanded the same from England; but she did not. As it was
England that, in consequence of her bankruptcy, solicited peace, France
offered it to her on the simple condition of her restoring the islands
she had taken. The ultimatum has been rejected, and the negociation
broken off. The spirited part of France will say, _tant mieux_, so much
the better.

** It was stipulated in the treaty of commerce between
France and England, concluded at Paris, that the sending
away an ambassador by either party, should be taken as an
act