companies of a British regiment, in order to build a fort there" -I have no intelligence that such an event has actually occurred. But even admitting your information to be accurate, much will depend on the place, in which you assert that the fort is intended to be erected. And whether it be for the purpose of protecting subjects of his majesty residing in districts dependent on the fort of Detroit, or of preventing that fortress from being straiten. ened by the approach of the American army. To either of which cases I imagine that the principle of the status quo, until the final arrangement of the points in discussion between the two countries shall be concluded, will strictly apply. In order however to correct any inaccurate information you may have received, or to avoid any ambiguity relative to this circumstance, I shall immediately transmit copies of your letter, and of this answer as well to the Governour General of his Majesty's pos sessions in North America and the Governour of Upper Canada, as to his Majesty's Ministers in England, for their respective information.

Before I conclude this letter, I must be permitted to observe that I have confined to the unrepressed and continued aggres. sions of the state of Vermont alone, the persuasion of Lord Dorchester, that they were indicative of an existing hostile disposition in the United States against Great Britain, and might ultimately produce an actual state of war on their part. If I had been desirous of recurring to other sources of disquietude, I might, from the allusion of his Lordship "to the conduct of this government towards the sca," have deduced other motives of apprehension on which, from the solicitude you evince to establish a "contrast between the temper observed on your part towards us and on our part towards you," I might have conceived myself justified in dilating. I might have adverted to the privateers originally fitted out at Charleston at the commencement of the present hostilities, and which were allowed to depart from that port, not only with the consent, but under the express permission of the Governour of South Carolina. I might have adverted to the prizes made by those privateers, of which the legality was in some measure admitted by the refusal of this government to restore such as were made antecedently to the 5th of June, 1793. I might have adverted to the permission granted by this government to the commanders of French ships of war and of privateers to dispose of their prizes by sale in ports of the United States. I might have adverted to the two privateers Le Petit Democrat (now la Cornelia) and le Carmagnol, both which were illegally fitted out in the river Delaware, and which in. consequence of my remonstrances and of the assurances I received, I concluded would have been dismantled: but which have remained during the whole winter in the port of New york armed, and now are, as I am informed, in a condition to proceed immediately to sea-I might have adverted

to the conduct which this government has observed towards the powers combined against France in the enforcement of the embargo: for while the vessels of the former are subjected to the restrictions of that measure, those of the latter have been permitted to depart from Hampton road, though three weeks had elapsed subsequently to the imposition of the embargo, though they were amenable to its operation, and though they were chiefly laden with articles " calculated to support an enemy whom we are seeking to bring to peace"-I might have adverted to the uniformly unfriendly treatment, which his Majesty's ships of war and officers in his Majesty's service have since the commencement of the present hostilities experienced in the American ports-and lastly, I might have adverted to the unparalled insult, which has been recently offered at New Port, Rhode-Island (not by a lawless collection of the people but) by the Governour and Council of that state, to the British flag, in the violent measures pursued towards his Majesty's sloop of war Nautilus, and in the forcible detention of the officers by whom she was commanded. I have however forborne to expatiate upon these points, because I am not disposed to consider them, as I have before stated, as necessary elucidations of the immediate object of your letter, and much less to urge them in their present form as general topicks of recrimination. I have the honour to be, &c. GEO. HAMMOND. Secretary of State.

May 23, 1794

True copy,

GEORGE TAYLOR, Jr.

Philadelphia, April 29, 1794.

SIR, Very Soon after the receipt of your letter of the 10th ult. I took more than one opportunity of mentioning to you verbally, that the government of the United States was sincere and constant in its determination to fulfil its assurances, concerning the districts occupied by the British troops, and the acts of violence said to be committed under the authority of the state of Vermont on the persons and property of British subjects, residing under the protection of your garrisons.

I indeed promised to give you an answer in writing at an earlier day than this. But being anxious to obtain particular information from a gentleman who was in town, well acquainted with the places to which you refer, and from some accident not being able as yet to lay my hands upon the letter of Mr. Jefferson to you on the 9th of July, 1792, I was hopeful, that my personal declarations to you would continue to receive such full confidence as to afford sufficient opportunity for the most particular inquiry. But being disappointed in seeing that gentleman, I think it best to answer your letter without further delay.

I have it in charge from the President of the United States again to assure you, that his purpose to cultivate harmony with your nation, and to prevent the measures of which you complain in the above letter, continues unchanged. Orders will be therefore immediately repeated upon this head, to repress the violences which you state; and they shall be accom. panied with an injunction to use against the refractors every coercion which the laws will permit. We have received no intelligence of the particular facts to which you refer. But to prevent all unnecessary circuity in first inquiring into them, and next transmitting to this city the result, the proper instructions will be given to act, without waiting for further directions. In these measures, sir, you will see a real disposition in us, to friendship and good neighbourhood: and I shall be justified by your own recollection, when I claim the merit of our having been uniform in the same demonstrations.

I have the honour to be, &c.

EDM. RANDOLPH. Mr. Hammond, Minister Plenipotentiary of Great Britain.

True copy,

GEO. TAYLOR, JR.

MESSAGE

FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES TO CONGRESS. JUNE 4, 1794.

I LAY before Congress the copy of a letter, with its enclosure, from the Secretary of State to the Minister Plenipoten. tiary of his Britannick Majesty; it being an answer to a letter from the Minister to him, bearing date the 22d ultimo, and already communicated. GEO. WASHINGTON.

Philadelphia, June 2, 1794. SIR,-If the letter with which you honoured me on the 22d ult. had not entered into a train of recrimination against the United States, I should not now trouble you with a return to its unpleasant topicks. Among the reasons which would have induced me to add nothing to my letter of the 1st of the last month, it would have been of some weight, that by silence I should avoid the repetition of a style and manner, which scem to have produced a personal excitement.

As you are willing to admit the authenticity of Lord Dorchester's speech, we will, with your approbation, reserve for a future discussion, on what occasion, and to what degree, an explanation may be required by the government of the United States from a foreign minister.

I selected only one passage of that speech, because in it was concentered the real object of the whole; which was to declare an expectation that Great Britain would be at war with the United States in the course of the present year, and, if she were, to cause the warriors to draw a line. This is the undis. guised sense of the governour-general, unaffected by the preliminary words which you have thought proper to quote. It is your own interpretation. For so far are you from contradicting my assertion, that Lord Dorchester fostered and encouraged in the Indians, hostile dispositions towards us, that you confine the greater part of your remaining observations to vindicate his persuasion and your own, that the principal aggression, leading to hostility, proceeded from the United States; and to suggest many others of the same tendency, upon which you would not dilate.

I shall not shrink, sir, from your charges,

1st. Notwithstanding the territory, upon which certain inhabitants of Vermont are represented in your letter of the 5th of -July, 1792, to have trespassed, belongs to the United States; yet on the 9th of the same month, did my predecessor give you, as is admitted, positive assurances of the determination to discourage and repress the subject of your complaint. The necessary instructions were accordingly forwarded to that state. On examining your correspondence with my department, it does not appear, that from the 9th of July, 1792, to the 10th of March, 1794, upwards of nineteen months, our government ever understood from yourself, or any authority of his Britannick Majesty, that the original dissatisfaction continued. Nor was any discontent heard from that quarter through other channels, except what related to outrages upon our own citizens by British subjects. Then, indeed, thirty days after the hostile tribes of Indians had been assembled by Lord Dorchester, at Quebec, you renew your remonstrance. Although it cannot be by any means believed, that this was -written in order to usher in the intelligence, which soon after arrived, of his speech; yet is it difficult to account for so long an interval under the circumstances supposed. Nor ought my answer, although delayed for fifty days, until the 29th of April, 1794, to be construed into an assent to any charge, since at the end of that period, having been disappointed, as my letter shows, in one opportunity of information, and no other presenting itself, we were not in a capacity of contradicting your assertions. However, sir, the instructions issued in consequence of your application, conveyed positive orders for the correction of what, upon examination, should be found irregular.

2d. Among the points, to which you intimate that you might have adverted, is enumerated the fitting out of two privateers,

at Charleston, in South Carolina.-Whatever this transaction might have been, it probably occurred at the commencement of the war, and before the existence of the war was communicated to our government, by any of the powers engaged. Had such a transaction been known to the President in time, you can well judge from his actual conduct, what he would then have done. His proclamation on the 22d of April, 1793; his call upon the state governours on the 26th of the same month, to co-operate with him in the work of impartiality and peace; the system of rules which he established, and which were imparted to you, are unerring indications of the spirit of those measures, on which he had determined. He suppressed the consular courts, which attempted to pass sentences of condemnation on captures ;-he restored several vessels to British owners;-prosecutions have been instituted against the violators of neutrality. In a word, sir, what has been required, under the sanction of the law of nations, which has not been fulfilled? How many things have been spontaneously done, to evince our impartiality? Let me request you to review my predecessor's letters to you of April 22, May 15, June 5, August 7, 8, 25, September 5 and 12, 1793; and to say if more could be well expected from us? After such demonstrations, it might have been hoped, that the equipment of these two privateers would not rise again in the shape of a charge. But the letter of the 5th of June being conceived of itself to be satisfactory, is here inserted. "In the letter which I had the honour of writing you on the 15th May, in answer to your several memorials of the 8th of that month, I mentioned that the President, reserved for further consideration, a part of the one which related to the equipment of two privateers in the port of Charleston. The part alluded to, was that wherein you express your confidence that the executive government of the United States would pursue measures for repressing such practices in future, and for restoring to their rightful owners any captures which such privateers might bring into the ports of the United States."

"The President, after a full investigation of this subject, and the most mature consideration, has charged me to communicate to you, that the first part of this application is found to be just, and that effectual measures are taken for preventing repetitions of the act therein complained of; but that the latter part, desiring restitution of the prizes, is understood to be inconsistent with the rules which govern such cases, and would, therefore, be unjustifiable towards the other party.

"The principal agents in this transaction were French citi zens. Being within the United States, at the moment a war broke out between their own and another country, they deter. mine to go in its defence; they purchase, arm and equip a vessel, with their own money, man it themselves, receive a regular commission from their nation, depart out of the United