Colonel [John] Laurens brought over the originals,
some of which, signed in the handwriting of the then secretary,
Germaine, are now in my possession.
Filled with these high ideas, nothing could be more insolent towards
America than the language of the British court on the proposed
mediation. A peace with France and Spain she anxiously solicited;
but America, as before, was to be left to her mercy, neither would she
hear any proposition for admitting an agent from the United States
into the congress of Vienna.
On the other hand, France, with an open, noble and manly
determination, and a fidelity of a good ally, would hear no
proposition for a separate peace, nor even meet in congress at Vienna,
without an agent from America: and likewise that the independent
character of the United States, represented by the agent, should be
fully and unequivocally defined and settled before any conference
should be entered on. The reasoning of the court of France on the
several propositions of the two imperial courts, which relate to us,
is rather in the style of an American than an ally, and she
advocated the cause of America as if she had been America herself.-
Thus the second mediation, like the first, proved ineffectual.
But since that time, a reverse of fortune has overtaken the
British arms, and all their high expectations are dashed to the
ground. The noble exertions to the southward under General [Nathaniel]
Greene; the successful operations of the allied arms in the
Chesapeake; the loss of most of their islands in the West Indies,
and Minorca in the Mediterranean; the persevering spirit of Spain
against Gibraltar; the expected capture of Jamaica; the failure of
making a separate peace with Holland, and the expense of an hundred
millions sterling, by which all these fine losses were obtained,
have read them a loud lesson of disgraceful misfortune and necessity
has called on them to change their ground.
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