Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 1.djvu/374

1800. the negotiations for peace with Austria; and thus two problems were solved.

Yet Talleyrand's precipitation in pledging France to prompt negotiation with the United States became a source of annoyance to the First Consul, whose shrewder calculation favored making peace first with Europe, in order to deal with America alone, and dictate his own terms. His brother Joseph, who was but an instrument in Napoleon's hands, but who felt a natural anxiety that his first diplomatic effort should succeed, became alarmed at the First Consul's coldness toward the American treaty, and at the crisis of negotiation, when failure was imminent, tried to persuade him that peace with the United States was made necessary by the situation in Europe. Napoleon met this argument by one of his characteristic rebuffs. "You understand nothing of the matter," he said; "within two years we shall be masters of the world." Within two years, in fact, the United States were isolated. Nevertheless Joseph was allowed to have his way. The First Consul obstinately refused to admit in the treaty any claim of indemnity for French spoliations on American commerce; and the American commissioners as resolutely refused to abandon the claim. They in their turn insisted that the new treaty should abrogate the guaranties and obligations imposed on the United States government by the old French treaty of alliance in 1778; and although