Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/373

quality which is called tact. He has been charged with obsequiousness to the French government. Those who make that charge leave out of sight the difficulties of his position. He had much to ask for and little to offer. He begged gracefully, accepted with dignity and showed his gratitude without stint, knowing that he would soon have to beg for more. He has been accused of being toward the last a little too easy and even indolent. In one respect this is true. He did not keep order in his accounts and correspondence. But in other respects he was wiser than those diplomats who always want to be doing something. He understood to perfection the great art of doing what was necessary and not trying too much, and of doing what he had to do in the most agreeable form. Thus he effected what he was sent for: to get from France all the aid that was needed for the accomplishment of American independence. In 1781, feeling the burden of his years,—he was then seventy-five,—he offered his resignation to Congress; but instead of accepting it, Congress added to his embassy the additional office of a member of the commission to conclude peace with England. He was associated with Jay and John Adams, whose services cannot be estimated too highly. In making the treaty of peace he vainly strove to realize one of his favorite ideas. He had long advocated the doctrine that free ships should make free goods, that is, that an enemy's goods carried in neutral ships should be exempt from seizure. He went even farther than that. “I wish,” he wrote to Robert Morris, “the powers would ordain that unarmed trading ships, as well as fishermen and farmers, should be respected as working for the common benefit of mankind, and never be interrupted in their operations even by national enemies; but let those only fight with one another whose trade it is and who are armed and paid for the purpose.” Privateering he condemned as little