The departure of both those
gentlemen from this place, soon after, occasioned an intermission in
the correspondence on this subject. But the United States continue to
be very sensibly affected by this delivery of their prizes to Great
Britain, and the more so, as no part of their conduct had forfeited
their claim to those rights of hospitality, which civilized nations
extend to each other. Not only a sense of justice due to the individuals
interested in those prizes, but also an earnest desire that no subject
of discontent may check the cultivation and progress of that friendship,
which they wish may subsist and increase between the two countries,
prompt them to remind his Majesty of the transaction in question; and
they flatter themselves, that his Majesty will concur with them in
thinking, that as restitution of the prizes is not practicable, it is
reasonable and just that he should render, and that they should accept,
a compensation equivalent to the value of them. And the same principles
of justice towards the parties, and of amity to the United States,
which influenced the breast of his Majesty to make, through the Baron de
Waltersdorff, the proposition of a particular sum, will surely lead him
to restore their full value, if that were greater, as is believed, than
the sum proposed.
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