fail, its failure must necessarily lead to very serious and immediate consequences.

In his choice of a minister, Lord Aberdeen was not less fortunate than he had been wise in proposing the measure. It was a decided advantage that a diplomatist by profession was not selected. Lord Ashburton was above the reach of the motives which influence politicians of an ordinary stamp, and unencumbered by the habits of routine which belong to men regularly trained in a career. He possessed a weight of charac ter at home which made him independent of the vulgar resorts of popularity. He was animated by a kindly feeling, and bound by kindly associations with this country. There was certainly no public man in England who united in an equal degree the confidence of his own government and country with those claims to the good-will of the opposite party, which were scarcely less essential to success. It may not be improper to add, that Mr. Webster had passed some months in England in 1839, had been received with great distinction and kindness by prominent men of all parties, and that Lord Ashburton, among others, had made his acquaintance. He knew, therefore, that his immediate intercourse with the American government would not be through an entire stranger, and was no doubt in some measure decided to accept the mission, by his reliance on the upright and honorable character of the American secretary.

With the appointment of Lord Ashburton, the discussion of the main questions in controversy between the two countries, as far as it had been carried on in London, was transferred to Washington. But as an earnest of the conciliatory spirit which bore sway in the British councils, Lord Aberdeen had announced to Mr. Everett, in the interval which elapsed between Lord Ashburton's appointment and his arrival at his place of destination, that the queen's government admitted the wrong done by the detention of the "Tigris" and "Seamew" in the African waters, and was prepared to indemnify their owners for the losses sustained.

Notwithstanding the favorable circumstances under which the mission of Lord Ashburton was instituted, the great difficulties to be overcome were not long in being felt. The points in dispute in reference to the boundary had for years been the subject of discussion, more or less, throughout the country, but

especially in Massachusetts and Maine (the states having an immediate territorial interest in its decision), and, above all, in the last-named state. Parties, differing on all other great questions, emulated each other in the zeal with which they asserted the American side of this dispute. So strong and unanimous was the feeling, that when the award of the King of the Netherlands arrived, the firm purpose of General Jackson to accept it was subdued. The writer of these pages was informed by the late Mr. Forsyth, while Secretary of State, that when the award reached this country, General Jackson regarded it as definitive, and was disposed, without consulting the Senate, to issue his proclamation announcing it as such; and that he was driven from this purpose by the representations of his friends in Maine, that such a course would cost them the state; and he was accustomed to add, in reference to the inconveniences caused by the rejection of the award, and the still more serious evils to be anticipated, that "it was somewhat singular, that the only occasion of importance in his life in which he had allowed himself to be overruled by his friends, was one of all others in which he ought to have adhered to his own opinions."

The following pages show that the first step taken by Mr. Webster, after receiving the directions of the President in reference to the negotiation, was to invite the co-operation of Massachusetts and Maine, the territory in dispute being the property of the two states, and under the jurisdiction of the latter. The extent of the treaty-making power of the United States, in a matter of such delicacy as the cession of territory claimed by a state to be within its limits, belongs to the more difficult class of constitutional doctrines. We have seen both the theory and practice of General Jackson on this point. The administration of Mr. Tyler took for granted that the full consent of Massachusetts and Maine was necessary to any adjustment of this great dispute on the principle of mutual cession and equiv alents, or any other principle than that of the ascertainment of the true original line of boundary by agreement, mutual commission, or arbitration. Communications were accordingly addressed to the governors of the two states. Massachusetts had anticipated the necessity of the measure, and made provision for the appointment of commissioners. The Legislature

of Maine was promptly convened for the same purpose by the late Governor Fairfield. Four parties were thus in presence at Washington for the management of the negotiation: the United States and Great Britain, Massachusetts and Maine. Recollecting that the question to be settled was one which had defied all the arts of diplomacy for half a century, it seemed to a distant, and especially a European observer, as if the last experiment, exceeding every former step in its necessary complication, was destined to a failure proportionably signal and ignominious. The writer of these remarks was in a condition. to know that the course pursued by the American secretary, in making the result of the negotiation relative to the boundary contingent upon the approval of the state commissioners, was regarded in Europe as decidedly ominous of its failure.

It undoubtedly required a high degree of political courage thus to put the absolute control of the subject, to a certain extent, out of the hands of the national government; but it was a courage fully warranted by the event. It is now evident that this mode of procedure was the only one which could have been adopted with any hope of success. Though complicated in appearance, it was in reality the simplest mode in which the co-operation of the states could have been secured. The commissions were, upon the whole, happily constituted; they were framed in each state without reference to party views. By their presence in Washington, it was in the power of the Secretary of State to avail himself, at every difficult conjuncture, of their counsel. Limited in number, they yet represented the public opinion of the two states, as fully as it could have been done by the entire body of their Legislatures; while it is quite evident that any attempt to refer to large deliberative bodies at home the discussion of the separate points which arose in the negotiation, would have been physically impossible and polit ically absurd. In looking back, after the lapse of a few years, at the correspondence between the commissioners and the Secretary of State, as it appears in the present volume, it must be admitted that there are occasionally, on the part of the former, a tone and spirit which we might wish to qualify, and which were not calculated at the time to advance the negotiations. It is always easy to make trouble; true statesmanship seeks, without compromise of principle, to save trouble, and by honorable

means to attain great ends. But it must, on the whole, be allowed that the concurrence of the states was yielded by their representatives as readily as could be expected under the circumstances of the case, and great credit is due to several of the gentlemen on the commissions for this result. They consisted, on the part of Maine, of Messrs. Edward Kavanagh, Edward Kent, William P. Preble, and John Otis; and on the part of Massachusetts, of Messrs. Abbott Lawrence, John Mills, and Charles Allen.

While we name with honor the gentlemen forming the commissions, a tribute of respect is also due to the patriotism of the states immediately concerned, and especially of Maine. To devolve on any individuals, however high in public regard, a power of transferring, without ratification or appeal, a portion of the territory of the state for such considerations as those individuals might judge to be adequate, was a measure to be expected only in a case of clear necessity and high confidence. Mr. Webster is known to have regarded this with the utmost concern and anxiety as the turning-point of the whole attempt. His letter to Governor Fairfield states the case with equal strength and fairness, and puts in striking contrast the course there recommended, with that of proceeding to agree to another arbitration, as had been offered by the preceding administration, and assented to by England. The fate of the negotiation might be considered as involved in the success of this appeal to the chief magistrate of Maine, and through him to his constituents. It is said that when Mr. Webster heard that the Legislature of Maine had adopted the resolutions for the commission, he went to President Tyler and said, with evident satisfaction and some animation, "The crisis is past."

A considerable portion, though not the whole, of the official correspondence between the Secretary of State and the other parties to the negotiation is contained in the following pages. The documents published of course exhibit full proof of the ability with which the argument was conducted. They probably furnish but an inadequate specimen of the judgment, tact, and moral power required to conduct such a negotiation to a successful result. National, state, and individual susceptibilities were to be respected and soothed; adverse interests, real or imaginary, to be consulted; the ordeal of the Senate to be

passed through after every other difficulty had been overcome, and all this in an atmosphere as little favorable to such an operation as can be imagined. What neither Mr. Monroe, in the "era of good feelings," nor the ability and experience of Messrs. Adams, Clay, and Gallatin, nor General Jackson's overwhelming popularity had been able to bring about, was effected under the administration of Mr. Tyler, though that administration seemed already crumbling to pieces for want of harmony between some of the members and the head, and between that head and the party which had brought him into power. No higher tribute can be paid to the ability and temper which were brought to the work.

It was, however, in truth, an adjustment equally honorable and advantageous to all parties. There is not an individual of common sense or common conscience in Maine or Massachusetts, in the United States or Great Britain, who would now wish it disturbed. It took from Maine a tract of land northwest of the St. John's, which the writer certainly believes belonged to her under the treaty of 1783. But it is not enough that we think ourselves right: the other party thinks the same; and when there is no common tribunal which both acknowledge, there must be compromise. The tract of land in question, for any purpose of cultivation or settlement, was without value; and had it been otherwise, it would not have been worth the cost of a naval armament or one military expedition, to say nothing of the abomination of shedding blood on such an issue. But the disputed title to this worthless tract of morass, heath, and rock, covered with snow or fog throughout the greater part of the year, was not ceded gratuitously. We obtained the navigation of the St. John's, the natural outlet of the whole country, without which the territory watered by it would have been of comparatively little value; we obtained a good natural boundary as far as the course of the river was followed; and we established the line which we claimed at the head of the Connecticut, on Lake Champlain, and on the upper lakes: territorial objects of considerable interest. Great Britain had equal reason to be satisfied with the result. For her the territory northwest of the St. John's, worthless to us, had a geographical and political value; it gave her a convenient connection between her two provinces, which was all she desired.