cast a gloom on our alliance be not dispelled, by frank and loyal explanations to which it will be anxious to listen, above all, Citizen Minister, when they shall be made through you.

Health and fraternity,

CH. DE LA CROIX,

No. 77.

[TRANSLATION.]

Extract from the Register of the Resolves of the Executive Directory, of the 14th Messidor, 4th Year of the French Republic, July 2, 1796. The Executive Directory, considering that, if it becomes the faith of the French nation to respect treaties or conventions which secure to the flags of some neutral or friendly Powers, commercial advantages, the result of which is to be common to the contracting Powers, those same advantages if they should turn to the benefit of our enemies, either through the weakness of our allies, or of neutrals, or through fear, through interested views, or through whatever motives, would in fact, warrant the inexecution of the articles in which they were stipulated-decrees as follows:

All neutral or allied Powers shall, without delay, be notified, that the flag of the French Republic will treat neutral vessels, either as to confiscation, as to searches, or capture, in the same manner as they shall suffer the English to treat them.

The Minister of Foreign Relations is charged with the execution of the present resolve, which shall not be printed.

A true copy:

CARNOT, President. By the Executive Directory: The Secretary General

True copy: The Minister of Foreign Affairs,

LAGARDE.

CH. DELACROIX.

True copy: The Minister Plenipotentiary of the French Republic, near the United States of America,

P. A. ADET.

No. 78.

French Minister of Foreign Affairs to Mr. Monroe, dated Paris, 21st Frimaire, 5th year of the Republic-Dec. 11, 1794.

CITIZEN MINISTER :

I hastened to lay before the executive directory the copy of your letter of recall, and of the credentials of Mr. Pinckney, whom the

President of the United States has appointed to succeed you as Mi. nister Plenipotentiary of the said States, near the French Republic.

The Directory has charged me to notify to you," that it will no longer recognize, nor receive, a Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States, until after a reparation of the grievances demanded of the American Government, and which the French Republic has a right to expect.

1 beg you, Citizen Minister, to be persuaded, that this determination, which is become necessary, does not oppose the continuance of the affection between the French Republic and the American people, which is grounded on former good offices and reciprocal interest; an affection which you have taken pleasure in cultivating by all the means in your power.

Accept, Citizen Minister, the assurance of my perfect consideration.

CH. DE LA CROIX.

No. 79.

Answer of the President of the French Directory to Mr. Monroe's Address on presenting his letter of recall-without date.

Mr. Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States of America: By presenting this day to the Executive Directory your letters of recall, you offer a very strange spectacle to Europe.

France, rich in her freedom, surrounded by the train of her victories, and strong in the esteem of her allies, will not stoop to calculate the consequences of the condescension of the American Government to the wishes of its ancient tyrants. The French Republic expects, however, that the successors of Columbus, Raleigh, and Penn, always proud of their liberty, will never forget that they owe it to France. They will weigh, in their wisdom, the magnanimous friendship of the French people, with the crafty caresses of perfidious men, who meditate to bring them again under their former yoke. Assure the good people of America, Mr. Minister, that, like them, we adore liberty; that they will always possess our esteem, and find in the French people that Republican generosity which knows how to grant peace, as well as to cause its sovereignty to be respected.

As for you, Mr. Minister Plenipotentiary, you have combatted for principles; you have known the truc interests of your country,-depart with our regret; we restore in you a representative to America; and we preserve the remembrance of the citizen whose personal qualities did honor to that title.

No. 80.

Report of Major Mountflorence to Mr. C. C. Pinckney, Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States to France, dated

CONSULAT AMERICAN, Paris, Dec. 18, 1796.

SIR: In the absence of Mr. Skipwith, I will endeavor. at your desire, to make you a succinct general report of the present situation of our commercial interests in this country, in the best manner that the shortness of the time will admit of.

Since several months the Directory Executive has given evident symptoms of displeasure towards our Government, which has been generally attributed to the treaty of commerce with Great Britain. In consequence thereof, orders have been issued to their cruisers to visit every neutral vessel going or coming from an English port. But these orders were common to the Danish and Swedish vessels as well as to our own. Numbers of our vessels have been brought into the ports of France by virtue of these orders; and, in a subsequent report, I shall have the honor of transmitting to you a nominative list of all of them, informing you of the several proceedings respecting each of them.

Several of them have been already released, some of the cargoes temporarily sequestered, and others now libelled before tribunals of commerce. During the government of the Convention, the Committee of Public Safety had exclusively the cognizance of all matters. respecting prizes and captures at sea. which committee gave judgments on the reports of the Executive commission of marine. But, since the organization of the present constitution, the Legislature has passed a law on the 27th of April last, giving power to the tribunals of commerce in every port of France to take cognizance, in the first instance, of every matter relative to captures at sea, from whose judgments appeals may be carried before the civil tribunals of the different Departments; and one of the articles in the aforesaid law enacts, that, in cases of appeal before the departmental tribunals, should the interest of neutrals be concerned, the Commissaries of the Executive Directory near such tribunals, (whose duties are similar to those of our Attorneys General,) may, if they see cause, refer the whole proceedings to the Minister of Justice, to take the opinion of the Directory thereon before judgments be given by the said tribunals. I deemed it necessary, sir, to enter into these particulars in order to elucidate the proceedings which have lately taken place in respect to some of our vessels captured and libelled.

The tribunals of commerce are chiefly composed of merchants, and most of them are directly or indirectly more or less interested in the fitting out of privateers, and, therefore, are often parties concerned in the controversies they are to determine upon. This happened in the case of Captain John Bryant, of Norfolk, in Virginia, which I beg leave to relate to you.

John Bryant, master of the Fanny of Portsmouth, Virginia, lost

that vessel at sea, having a sea letter which he preserved, and was taken up by the brig Frances, of Salem, and carried to Spain, from whence he returned to Norfolk, where, having received the command of the Powhatan, of Richmond, he proceeded in her to London, where the said vessel was sold by the owners.

He purchased in England, from our Mr. Joshua Johnson, a prize vessel, the Royal Captain, and traded with her under the flag of the United States, and made several coasting voyages from one French port to another, his ship's papers having been found regular: but lately, bound from Flushing to Bordeaux, with a cargo belonging to him, he was captured by a privateer belonging to Boulogne, and brought into that port. The judges of the tribunal are most of them concerned in this privateer, and of course condemned the Royal Captain as a lawful prize, under pretence that she has no sea letter. Appeal has been made from the judgment, and the case referred to the Minister of Justice. Mr. Skipwith and myself waited on that Minister, and had a long conference with him on the proper construction to be made of the twenty-fifth article of the treaty of commerce between the United States and France. The Minister having acknowledged the Royal Captain and her cargo to be American property, but insisting on its being liable to condemnation, not being furnished with a sea letter, we urged to him that the very article of the treaty upon which he founded his opinion, did not specify seizure or confiscation of vessels that should not be provided with sea letters; that every penal law was to be construed liberally; that the object of the treaty must have been reciprocal benefit to the merchants and the commerce of both countries that the interpretation by him given to that article would operate in a quite opposite manner, and place the merchants of the United States in a worse situation than if there had been no treaty, which most certainly could never have been the intention of either of the contracting parties; for, if there existed no treaty, most undoubtedly an American vessel being brought into a French port would be immediately released upon due proof being made of her being American property, and consequently neutral. Besides, we alleged that this doctrine had been sanctioned in France since the commencement of hostilities, several hundreds of our vessels having visited their ports, and no exception being taken to the want of sea letters-indeed, they have never been heretofore asked for ;-that the French Government had sold a very considerable number of prize vessels to our merchants in payment of supplies furnished or otherwise, some of which had been chartered by the very agents of the Government for sundry voyages in Europe, all of which had no sea letters, nor could they even obtain any before they made a voyage to the United States. All we could obtain from the Minister was, his saying he would consider the matter, and take the decision of the Directory. Nothing yet has transpired upon the subject; but two days ago, letters were received from Brest, mentioning that the Diana, Captain Ingraham, from Savannah to Europe, sent into Brest by a French privateer, has been condemned by the Tribunal of Commerce of that port, and that the only motive for

condemnation was the want of a sea letter. I have written to Mr. Barnet, the Consular Agent at Brest, to instruct the counsellor on the appeal to apply to the Commissary of the Directory near the tribunal of the Department to have the matter referred to the Minister of Justice.

Should the Directory, sir, decide this important question on the construction of the twenty-fifth article, in the same manner as the Tribunals of Commerce have done, it would be very alarming to our trade, as we have a vast number of vessels in that predicament, many of which are now in the several ports of France.

As to the several claims of American citizens against the French Government, for supplies furnished here and in the West Indies, spoliations, embargoes at Bordeaux and Brest, and other ports; indemnities for illegal captures and detentions of our vessels, freights of vessels chartered by the French agents in the United States, drafts of the colonial administrations upon the national treasury; delegations of the said administrations upon the Ministers of France near the United States; nothing can be done with them for the moment: but this suspension is common to all the claimants of the other neutral nations, as likewise to the French creditors, for, indeed, the embarrassments of their finances are such that many of the officers of Government cannot obtain the payment of the arrears due them.

I deem it also my duty to inform you that a foreign built sloop, the Nancy, Captain Berry, having been detained at Calais by the custom-house officers of that port, the Tribunal of Commerce ordered her to be released, provided the Minister of the United States near the French Republic would countersign her ship's papers. Having at this moment no Minister acknowledged by this Government. Captain Berry writing very pressing letters to be able to comply with the order of the Tribunal, which order is conformable to a late regulation of the Directory, I have waited on the Minister of Foreign Relations to submit the difficulty we labor under in that respect, and shall have the honor of communicating to you his answer when it shall be given. With great respect,

I have the honor to be

Your most obedient and

Most humble servant,

J. C. MOUNTFLORENCE.

No. 81.

Mr. Pickering, Secretary of State, to Mr. C. C. Pinckney, Minister to France, dated Department of State, January 21st, 1797.

[EXTRACT.]

"The Commissioners and Special Agents of the French Republic, in the West Indies, are destroying our commerce in the most wanton