The British commissioners were instructed accordingly.
Of this the Americans were, of course, ignorant. Only Clay felt it intuitively. According to Mr. Adams's Diary, Clay had “an inconceivable idea that they will recede from the ground they have taken.” That is to say, he had the instinct of the situation. The British dropped their sine qua non; they gave up a proposition which they made to treat on the basis of uti possidetis, each nation to hold what it possessed or occupied at the time of signing the treaty; they finally showed themselves willing to accept the American proposition of the status ante bellum as a basis for the final arrangement. But one thing they would not do: they would not listen to anything about stipulations touching principles of blockade, rights of neutrals, impressment and right of search, concerning which the Americans insisted upon submitting the draft of an article. This they declined so peremptorily that all further discussion seemed useless. What, then, became of “Free Trade and Seamen's Rights?” What of the original instruction that the commissioners should break off forthwith and come home if they failed in obtaining a concession with regard to impressment? President Madison had in the mean time reconsidered the matter and sent further instructions authorizing them to treat on the basis of the status ante bellum, — substantially, to restore things to the state in which the war had found them. Not
