21. III:30. This morning Fahrenheits Thermometer was at 42. and I was so pinched
with cold that it was with the utmost difficulty, I could write without
a fire— Mrs
Cornell with Bestor, and Mrs Jones came again to the
Office— I told Mrs Cornell, that the
President would now see
her—that an immediate pardon could not probably issue; but a further
reprieve would probably be granted during which new applications in
favour of her son might be made— She said if his life could but be
spared he would cheerfully submit to any term of imprisonment. Mrs Jones I referred as the President had
directed to the Commissioners of the Navy— At the President’s I found he
was preparing to leave the City again to-morrow morning for his seat at
Oakhill, in Loudoun County, Virginia. I had a long conversation with him
again upon the Instructions to be given to Mr
Gallatin. We concluded that the basis of arrangement
proposed by Baron Pasquier
could not be accepted by us— The motives and principles upon which we
arrived at this conclusion are to be stated in the Instructions, for
which reason as well as for want of time I shall omit the detail of them
here. But it appears to me that the greatest difficulty of our present
position is with Spain— When the Session of Congress comes, we shall be
still with the Treaty unratified, after threatening measures to take
possession of Florida; and postponing them only to give the Cortes an
opportunity to do us Justice— The Cortes will do nothing, and the
question what we are to do will come upon us with double recoil. The
President I found had no inclination to take forcible measures. Symptoms
of convulsions in Europe are thickening— The revolution in Spain has
been acted over again at Naples— The Emperor
of Russia has issued a fulminating declaration against the
Spanish Revolution, and Austria is marching troops against that of
Naples— A plan of Counter revolution has exploded in Spain and a civil
War between Naples and the Island of Sicily appears to be impending.
France, England Germany emit volcanic smoke, and time is teeming with
another great political earthquake— Our own situation is uncomfortable;
our finances disordered; our resources decayed; and tranquility seems in
the 422view of the President, the pole-star of our
policy. Of all political courses the easiest for execution is that which
consists in doing nothing— Far niente— But it has a result, which seldom
turns to good account; it effects nothing— I told the President that the
non-ratification of the Treaty would give no dissatisfaction in this
Country, excepting to the persons, whose claims were provided for in it.
The Southern and Western People would be glad to have the Treaty set
aside. But as Spain will do nothing and is likely to fall into civil
War, a movement of the People of Pensacola, and Saint Augustine may be
anticipated and might be hastened by which they would assume the
Government into their own hands, and then apply to the United States,
for protection— Under some such circumstances whether hastened by any
agency on our part, or merely waited for, I was convinced we should
ultimately be obliged to take possession of Florida, and with it, I
thought the recognition of the Republic of Colombia, ought to be
simultaneous— The President did not appear to think the time was matured
for the recognition of any of the South-American Governments— He told me
he should be at Oakhill, ready at any time at a days warning to come to
the City— He read me a letter from New-York being an account of his Son
in Law Gouverneur’s being
dangerously ill with a bilious fever.— There was a Doctor Washington at the Office,
who came to ask for a subscription to a medical Miscellany— I was alone
at home, morning and Evening; but so occupied that I was scarcely
sensible of the lapse of time.
