selves the trouble they do. Your letter of September 1st, surprises me a little by the "If the Preliminarys succeed," which is more than once repeated; because I don't see a possibility of receding were we inclined to it. You do not say what the affair of the logwood is, so I can make no judgment of it. If it is only an immediate cession of these settlements, which we have no sort or pretence of right to, I think it to our honour.
A cessation of arms, if the preliminarys are as fixed as I imagined, cannot be a question. If indeed we are only treating with a probability of being forced to declare off and continue the war, it is another question and what I am no judge of. But upon the whole it is easy, even at this distance, to see that no terms of Peace would either lessen or increase the clamour. It is aimed at Lord Bute, not at his measures, and which is shameful, many who approve the Peace will join in opposing it as a means of destroying him. But I hope every step will be taken and endeavour used to weather this storm: it will be weathered and halcyon days succeed, that is such halcyon days as Ministers can have.
Ever yours,
H. Fox.
The capture of the Havannah was known in England by the end of September.[1] The Spaniards, before the news arrived, had been delaying the signature of the preliminaries, under which they were required to concede all the three points which they had used as their pretext for declaring war, viz. the legality of the captures made by English cruisers, the right of the English logwood cutters in Honduras, and those of the Spanish fishermen off Newfoundland. Grimaldi was now as anxious as he had previously been unwilling to sign, but, on the other hand, all the English Ministers, with the exception of Bute, were unanimously in favour of asking a territorial equivalent for the retrocession of the Havannah. It was in vain that Bedford, who had gone as Plenipotentiary to Paris,
- ↑ Egremont to Bedford, September 29th, 1762.
