I told him without hesitation, that our treaty obliged
us to receive the armed vessels of France, with their prizes, into our
ports, and to refuse the admission of prizes made on her by her enemies;
that there was a clause by which we guarantied to France her American
possessions, and which might, perhaps, force us into the war, if these
were attacked. 'Then it will be war,' said he, 'for they will assuredly
be attacked.' I added, that our dispositions would be to be neutral, and
that I thought it the interest of both those powers that we should be
so, because it would relieve both from all anxiety as to the feeding
their West India islands, and England would, moreover, avoid a heavy
land war on our continent, which would cripple all her proceedings
elsewhere. He expected these sentiments from me personally, and he knew
them to be analogous to those of our country. We had often before had
occasions of knowing each other: his peculiar bitterness towards us
had sufficiently appeared, and I had never concealed from him, that I
considered the British as our natural enemies, and as the only nation
on earth, who wished us ill from the bottom of their souls.
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