Of the chief commercial nations of Europe, Holland entertained for America the most friendly sentiments, invited her trade, and readily granted to her congress all the credit which it had any right to expect. The independence of the United States gave umbrage to the Spanish court. Galvez, the minister of the colonies, was fiercely and persistently hostile to the extent of the United States in the South-west. Florida Blanca himself wished for amicable rectifications of the boundary; but, on the remonstrances of Lafayette, he, in the presence of the ambassador of France, pledged his word of honor to accept the boundary as laid down in the Anglo-American treaty, and authorized Lafayette to bind him with congress to that pledge. The Spanish statesmen feared the loss of their own colonies, and the success of the American revolution excited new and never-ceasing alarm. They could have wished that North America might disappear from the face of the earth; but they tried to reconcile themselves to living in good harmony with the United States. The Mississippi was the great source of anxiety. Spain thought it not for her interest that the American states should consolidate their union. She had dreaded the neighborhood of English colonies to her own; she dreaded still more to border all the way from the Atlantic to the fountains of the Mississippi on a republic whose colossal growth was distinctly foreseen. Besides this, the suppression of a rebellion in South America had just cost more than a hundred thousand lives; and the difficulty of governing distant and boundless regions was so great that Aranda, the far-sighted statesman who had signed the treaty of peace, in his official dispatches to Florida Blanca, set forth the opinion that Portugal would be worth more to Spain than all the American main-land. Of the islands he never depreciated the value; but he clearly perceived how precarious was the hold of Spain on her continental possessions; and he left on record the advice, which he may never have had an opportunity to offer personally to his king, that Spain should transform all the vice-royalties in America into secundo-genitures, retaining in direct dependence only Cuba and Porto Rico.* * Ferro del Rio, iii., 460, 407, note. Muriel, vi, 45-54. Revista Española de Even Vergennes, while he believed that the attachment of America to the alliance would be safest if the confederation could keep itself alive, held it best for France that the United States should fail to attain the political consistency of which he saw that they were susceptible; and he remained a tranquil spectator of their efforts for a better constitution. Lafayette not only watched over the interests of America in Europe, but to the president of congress and to the secretary for foreign affairs he sent messages imploring American patriots to strengthen the federal union. Ambos Mundos, for May 1855, written by Ferro del Rio. In his letter on exchanging for Portugal the Spanish possessions in America, Aranda writes, "ex. ceptuando las islas." The train of thought is the same. CHAPTER V. A CALL ON THE ARMY TO INTERPOSE. JANUARY-MARCH 1783. In the fall of 1782 the main army was moved for winter quarters to the wooded hills in the rear of Newburg. No part of the community had undergone equal hardships or borne injustice with equal patriotism. In the leisure of the camp they brooded over their wrongs and their chances of redress, and at the close of the year the officers sent to Philadelphia as their committee Major-General Macdougall and Colonels Ogden and Brooks, who, in their address of the sixth of January 1783, used these words: "To the United States in congress assembled: We, the officers of the army of the United States, in behalf of ourselves and our brethren the soldiers, beg leave freely to state to the supreme power, our head and sovereign, the great distress under which we labor. Our embarrassments thicken so fast that many of us are unable to go farther. Shadows have been offered to us, while the substance has been gleaned by others. The citizens murmur at the greatness of their taxes, and no part reaches the army. We have borne all that men can bear. Our property is expended; our private resources are at an end. We therefore beg that a supply of money may be forwarded to the army as soon as possible. "The uneasiness of the soldiers for want of pay is great and dangerous; further experiments on their patience may have fatal effects. There is a balance due for retained rations, forage, and arrearages on the score of clothing. Whenever there has been a real want of means, defect in system, or VOL. VI.-6 neglect in execution, we have invariably been the sufferers by hunger and nakedness, and by languishing in a hospital. We beg leave to urge an immediate adjustment of all dues. "We see with chagrin the odious point of view in which the citizens of too many of the states endeavor to place the men entitled to half-pay. For the honor of human nature we hope that there are none so hardened in the sin of ingratitude as to deny the justice of the reward. To prevent altercations, we are willing to commute the half-pay pledged for full-pay for a certain number of years, or for a sum in gross. And in this we pray that the disabled officers and soldiers, with the widows and orphans of those who have expended, or may expend, their lives in the service of their country, may be fully comprehended. "General dissatisfaction is gaining ground in the army, from evils and injuries which, in the course of seven long years, have made their condition in many instances wretched. They therefore entreat that congress, to convince the army and the world that the independence of America shall not be placed on the ruin of any particular class of her citizens, will point out a mode for immediate redress." The grand committee to whom the memorial was referred held a conference with the superintendent of finance. He declared peremptorily that it was impossible, in the present state of the finances, to make any payment to the army, and that it would be imprudent to give assurances with regard to future pay until funds that could be relied upon should be established. Not only had he no money in hand, but he had overdrawn his account in Europe to the amount of three and a half millions of livres. He therefore asked a decision on the expediency of staking the public credit on further drafts to be met by the contingent proceeds of a loan from the Dutch and by the friendship of France. On the tenth of January, congress, under an injunction of secrecy, authorized the superintendent to draw bills on the credit of applications for loans in Europe. Dyer of Connecticut alone opposed the measure as unwarranted and dishonorable, but allowed the resolution to be entered as unanimous.* * Gilpin, 248-252, 299; Elliot, 21, 22, 38; Secret Journals of Congress, i., 258. * In an interview with the grand committee on the evening of the thirteenth, the deputies from the army explained that, without an immediate payment of some part of the overdue pay, the discontent alike of officers and soldiers could not be soothed; that a mutiny might ensue; and that it would be hard to punish soldiers for a breach of engagements to the public which the public itself had already flagrantly broken. “The army,” said Macdougall, “is verging to that state which, we are told, will make a wise man mad." It was a source of irritation that the members of the legislatures never adjourned till they had paid themselves fully, that all on the civil lists of the United States regularly received their salaries, and that all on the military lists were as regularly left unpaid. † The deputies animadverted with surprise and even indignation on the repugnance of some of the states to establish a federal revenue for discharging federal engagements, while the affluence of the people indicated adequate resources. Speaking with peculiar emphasis and making a strong impression by his manner, General Macdougall declared "that the most intelligent part of the army were deeply touched by the debility of the federal government and the unwillingness of the states to invigorate it; in case of its dissolution, the benefits expected from the revolution would be greatly impaired; and the contests which might ensue among the states would be sure to embroil their respective officers." Hamilton had for himself renounced the half-pay. The grand committee, in their report which he drafted, advised some payment to the army as soon as possible; for the rest, they were to have no priority over other creditors; all were to wait alike for the funding of the whole debt of the United States by general revenues. The officers were to have the option of preserving their claim to half-pay as it then stood, or accepting a commutation. + "A great majority of the members of congress," avowed Robert Morris, "will not adopt the necessary measures because they are afraid of offending their states;" and he un *Gilpin, 256, 257; Elliot, 23. Gilpin, 256-258; Elliot, 23, 24; Washington to J. Jones, Sparks, viii., 370. |