Chapter I

RESULTS OF YORKTOWN. PAGE Fall of Lord North's ministry 1 Sympathy between British Whigs and the revolutionary party in America 2 It weakened the Whig party in England 3 Character of Lord Shelburne 4 Political instability of the Rockingham ministry 5, 6 Obstacles in the way of a treaty of peace 7, 8 Oswald talks with Franklin 9–11 Grenville has an interview with Vergennes 12 Effects of Rodney's victory 13 Misunderstanding between Fox and Shelburne 14 Fall of the Rockingham ministry 15 Shelburne becomes prime minister 16 Defeat of the Spaniards and French at Gibraltar 17 French policy opposed to American interests 18 The valley of the Mississippi; Aranda's prophecy 19 The Newfoundland fisheries 20 Jay detects the schemes of Vergennes 21 And sends Dr Vaughan to visit Shelburne 22 John Adams arrives in Paris and joins with Jay in insisting upon a separate negotiation with England 23, 24 The separate American treaty, as agreed upon: 1. Boundaries 25 2. Fisheries; commercial intercourse 26 3. Private debts 27 4. Compensation of loyalists 28–32 Secret article relating to the Yazoo boundary 33 Vergennes does not like the way in which it has been done 33 On the part of the Americans it was a great diplomatic victory 34 Which the commissioners won by disregarding the instructions of Congress and acting on their own responsibility 35 The Spanish treaty 36 The French treaty 37 Coalition of Fox with North 38–42 They attack the American treaty in Parliament 43 And compel Shelburne to resign 44 Which leaves England without a government, while for several weeks the king is too angry to appoint ministers 44 Until at length he succumbs to the coalition, which presently adopts and ratifies the American treaty 45 The coalition ministry is wrecked upon Fox's India Bill 46 Constitutional crisis ends in the overwhelming victory of Pitt in the elections of May, 1784 47 And this, although apparently a triumph for the king, was really a death-blow to his system of personal government 48, 49