Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 7.djvu/351

1793-4] French Decrees ; British Orders in Council. 319 which the two contracting parties agreed to stop the trade in question. In May France retaliated, and ordered the seizure of neutral ships loaded with provisions for an enemy's ports. Gouverneur Morris, then American minister at Paris, protested so vigorously that in the space of eight weeks the decree was twice repealed and twice again put in force. In June British cruisers were commanded to bring into port every neutral ship found carrying flour, corn, or meal, to any port of France. Not content with this the British government issued, in November, 1793, an Order in Council, aimed at the trade of neutrals with the French colonies. Commanders of British cruisers and privateers were bidden to send in for condemnation neutral vessels carrying provisions to a French colony, or bringing away anything that a French colony produced. They also began to search American ships for British seamen. France then laid an embargo on neutral ships in the port of Bordeaux ; and at the close of the year 1793 one hundred and three American ships were in French hands. Hundreds more were in the ports of the French Antilles ; and these, as they came forth on their homeward voyage, were seized by English cruisers and hurried to the nearest Vice-admiralty Court for judgment. For months the maritime news of the Advertisers and Gazettes consisted chiefly of accounts of ships condemned at Halifax, at New Providence, at Nassau, at St Kitt's. A great cry went up from the ruined merchants of Portsmouth, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston ; and Congress at its next session was appealed to for help. The response was speedy. Resolutions for discriminating tonnage duties were introduced; appropriations were voted for building arsenals, pur- chasing ammunition, erecting coast fortifications, and building six frigates; an embargo for thirty days was imposed; a resolution to sequester debts due to British merchants was offered; and a bill to declare non-intercourse with Great Britain, after passing the House, was defeated in the Senate by the casting-vote of the Vice-President. Alarmed at the rising spirit of hostility towards Great Britain, Washington determined to make a great effort for peace, and, with the consent of the Senate, sent Chief Justice John Jay to London with the offer of a treaty of amity and commerce. In the midst of this excite- ment Great Britain recalled her Order of November, 1793, and issued a new one (January 8, 1794). Naval officers and masters of privateers were instructed to send in for judgment such neutral vessels, and such only, as were found trading directly between any port in the French West Indies and any port in Europe. With this prohibition on direct trade she rested content ; and during four years the Order remained in force. The chief grievances against Great Britain were now eight in number. The delimitation of the North-East boundary was still in dispute. The forts on the Canadian borders were still in British hands. No compen- sation had been made for the negroes carried off at the evacuation of CH. IX.