carried out immediately after the war, while the other could
not be effected before 1917. That this was not done earlier is a sad
reflection on American diplomacy.

The negotiation for the purchase of these islands began January, 1865,
when Secretary of State Seward and General Raasloff, the Danish
Minister to the United States, met at a dinner party.[391] Seward
wanted them for a naval station. The minister was not in favor of it
and did not think the King of Denmark would sell, and so Denmark
replied. When the unfavorable report came, Seward was confined to his
bed and the minister was advised to drop it and leave it to the United
States to take it up again. Then came the assassination of Lincoln and
the attack on Seward. In the meantime there came to power in Denmark a
new ministry favorable to the project. The instructions then were to
say that the government had no desire to sell but would not be
unwilling to entertain Seward's proposition. Not long thereafter
Seward went to Cuba for his health and on the way saw St. Thomas. He
then became resolved to buy and asked Denmark to name a price, but she
refused. The plan, however, was laid before the Danish Cabinet in
1866. The Danes were reluctant to alienate these islands because they
loved the colony. They believed, too, that the sale would offend
England, France, and Spain. Mr. Seward and Mr. Yeamen, our minister at
Copenhagen, however, pushed it and the Danish government finally
offered the United States the three islands for $15,000,000. Denmark
was finally persuaded to sell St. Thomas and St. John for $7,500,000.
A vote of the natives was taken and they agreed to the transfer of
their country to the United States. The treaty was laid before the
United States Senate but delayed on account of the serious trouble
then existing between Charles Sumner, the chairman of the Foreign
Relations Committee, and the administration. The Danish government
regarded this an indignity of the worst kind. The time for
ratification was extended but the treaty finally fell a victim to the
storm of political hatred then raging, and it was dropped in 1868.
After an adverse report of the Foreign Relations Committee of the
Senate it was finally rejected in 1870.[392]

After this the situation of Denmark became such that the transfer of
the islands would have been almost impossible even if the two
countries had come to another agreement. By a secret alliance between
Germany and Russia, D