were left in the possession and at the disposal of the claimants, the case not only proves a substantial sale of slaves captured as prize of war, but furnishes a precedent of a mode of transfer by which sales, not ostensible but real, could be effected in all other cases of capture, without being fettered by the act of Parliament for the abolition of the slave trade, or by the Order in Council for giving it effect.

The undersigned deems it his further duty to remark, that neither of these two documents does in terms limit the disposal of all negroes captured at sea and condemned to the king as prize of war to their enlistment in the army or navy, or to their being bound to apprenticeships for a term of years. The act and the Order both confine the authority to make this disposal of negro prisoners of war to natives of Africa, and consequently neither of these provisions could apply to the slaves taken from the United States, none or scarcely any of which were natives of Africa. The act provides that all slaves taken as prize of war shall for the purposes only of seizure, prosecution, and condemnation, be adjudged as slaves and property; that they shall be condemned as prize of war, for the purpose only of divesting and barring the proper right and property of their owners; and that they shall nevertheless in no case be liable to be sold or disposed of as slaves, by the king, or by any person claiming under him, or by force of the sentence of condemnation. But the provision of the act relative to the disposal after condemnation of slaves other than natives of Africa is merely negative that they shall not be sold or treated as slaves by the king. How they shall be treated the act does not prescribe. The crown itself is not authorized compulsorily to enlist them, or to bind them to apprenticeships, the proviso containing that authority being limited to natives of

Africa. The Order in Council follows exactly the expressions of the act. It authorizes the collectors of the customs to receive, protect, and provide, for other negroes condemned as prize of war; but neither the act nor the Order in Council directs or authorizes the manner in which they shall be protected or provided for, and by expressly prescribing that they shall not be sold or treated by the king as slaves, without including them in the exception of the proviso, the act obviously exempts them from the liability to compulsive enlistment or apprenticeship to which the natives of Africa are subjected. It may be added that if the slaves condemned to the king in the case of the Wilhelmina had been received, protected, and provided for by the collector of customs according to the regulations of this act of Parliament and this Order in Council, there would be no necessity at this time for referring to the island of Jamaica to ascertain how they had been disposed of, the sentence of the Court of Vice-Admiralty which condemns them to the king being dated on the 31st of August, 1813, and the Order in Council expressly requiring the collector of the customs authorized to receive, protect, and provide for such condemned negroes, to transmit an annual report of all his proceedings under this authority, with accurate accounts specifying the numbers, names, sexes, and ages, of the negroes by him received and disposed of, to his Maj-. esty's principal Secretary of State for the Colonial Department. If no such return has been made, and if it should prove that the ultimate disposal of those slaves was altogether different from that prescribed by the act of Parliament and the Order in Council for natives of Africa, his Majesty's government can have no difficulty in ascertaining in how many other cases of capture of slaves the forms of the Vice-Admiralty Court observed

in the case of the Wilhelmina were applied during the

war.

The undersigned prays Lord Castlereagh to accept the assurance of his high consideration.

On the 4th instant I received from him the note dated 27 April, a copy of which is herewith enclosed, together with copies of the act of Parliament for the abolition of the slave trade, and of the Order in Council of 16 March, 1808. My reply to his Lordship's note was sent to him yesterday. I also transmit a copy of it. The earnestness with which the subject continues to be pressed indicates an object not exclusively confined to the vindication of the character of the British nation. There appears great confidence that the depositions which testify to open sales of the slaves will be totally disproved, and you will observe Lord Castlereagh's disposition to confine the investigation to the special facts stated in those depositions. The stronghold of this confidence is that such sales would be felony, and this of itself tends to discredit the testimony of Patrick Williams and of Hall. I have made no remark on the character of the emancipation bestowed by the act of Parliament, but if its bounties, its enlistments, and its apprenticeships, have been applied to the slaves from the United States to whom freedom

was promised, it is no wonder that such freedom should have been taken for another face of slavery.

I am, etc.1

1

TO GEORGE WILLIAM ERVING

MY DEAR SIR:

EALING, 21 May, 1816.

On the 28th of March I enclosed under cover to Mr. Hottinguer letters for you from the Duke of Sorentino, with a few lines of most pacific exhortation of my own. I hope you received the whole upon your arrival in Paris. A few days since I had the pleasure of receiving your favor of the 5th instant from Havre, and thank you cordially for the information contained in it. I have no copy of the cipher which you mention, and if I had could say nothing more than what I have said, keep the peace with Spain. You know that six frigates have been sent out with troops to the Bahama Islands, to keep down the negroes. You know that Colonel Nicholls brought over here certain pretended Creek Indians, one of whom has received a Major's commission in the British service. You know that Lord Exmouth 3 has made peace for Sardinia and Naples with Algiers, and ransomed their prisoners at 500 and 1000 dollars a man. You know that the Dey has returned Decatur's treaty as a dead letter, and that we have another peace to make there. You

1 On May 12 Adams had a conversation with Lord Castlereagh and Lord Melville, first lord of the admiralty, on Exmouth's expedition to the Barbary States. It is fully given in the Memoirs, under that date, and a copy was sent to the Secretary of State as dispatch No. 45, May 18.

The prophet Francis was made a brigadier general in the royal service. 3 Edward Pellew, Viscount Exmouth (1757-1833).

know that this country continues armed cap-a-pie by sea and by land, that the bank has carte blanche to coin paper for two years longer, and yet that the guinea scarcely fetches a pound note and a base shilling. Beware of breakers and keep the peace with Spain. I have the most positive assurance that there has been no cession nor talk of cession of Florida to Great Britain. Don't believe the stories they tell you about distress in this country and Ireland. There never was so little distress and never so little discontent-a riot here and there since bread has grown dear again notwithstanding.

I remain, etc.

MY DEAR SIR:

TO JOHN ADAMS

EALING, 29 May, 1816.

It was only three days since that Mr. Prescott called out here and left your kind favor of 2 and 11 September last, enclosing one from Mr. Richard Sears, of Chatham, concerning the subject of the fisheries. I happened at the time when Mr. Prescott came to be in London, and have not yet had the pleasure of seeing him.

The question relating to the fisheries has been largely discussed between me and the British government, but hitherto without any other result than a proposal from them to negotiate an amicable arrangement of the matter at issue between the two countries, and an acceptance of that proposal on the part of the United States. Authority and instructions were sent to me to negotiate a convention to this effect, but it arrived too late to be acted upon. A power to negotiate on the same point had already been sent to Mr. Bagot, and