bility of securing a settlement of the boundary. Peel, who had visited California also, summed up his impressions by declaring: "The American settlements on the Willamette, running south, and those on the Sacramento running north, will . . . very soon unite. Their junction will render the possession of port San Francisco to the Americans inevitable. . . ."
Its possible influence. The clear knowledge of conditions in Oregon interpreted to the British government the American attitude on the Oregon question. They now knew why our government refused to accede to the offer of the Columbia boundary, even with port privileges to the north; they knew, also, why Congress was so determined to bring the Oregon question to an issue, even if that issue meant war.
With this knowledge in their possession, the British government was politically in position to recede from the principles of the Canning boundary without loss of parliamentary or popular support. We now know that Lord Aberdeen at least, and possibly also Sir Robert Peel, had long been ready, as individuals, to accept the forty-ninth parallel boundary, with modifications as to Vancouver's Island, the free use of the northern ports and of the Columbia River for commercial purposes.^ But the cabinet, the Parliament, and the country must be educated to the necessity of giving up Canning's policy and this made necessary a
1 This fact is revealed in a private letter of Aberdeen to Pakenham dated March 4, 1844.
