Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 2.djvu/28

1803. point identical. News of the closure of the Mississippi by Morales had reached Paris, and had already caused an official protest by Livingston, when Talleyrand drew up the instructions to Bernadotte:—


 * "Louisiana being soon to pass into our hands, with all the rights which have belonged to Spain, we can only with pleasure see that a special circumstance has obliged the Spanish Administration to declare formally [constater] its right to grant or to refuse at will to the Americans the privilege of a commercial entrepôt at New Orleans; the difficulty of maintaining this position will be less for us than that of establishing it. . . . Yet in any discussion that may arise on this subject, and in every discussion you may have to sustain, the First Consul wishes you to be informed of his most positive and pronounced desire to live in good understanding with the American government, to cultivate and to improve for the advantage of American commerce the relations of friendship which unite the two peoples.  No one in Europe wishes the prosperity of that people more than he.  In accrediting you to its Government he has given it a peculiar mark of his good disposition; he doubts not that you will make every effort to bind closer the ties which exist between the two nations.  In consequence of the firm intention which the First Consul has shown on this subject, I must recommend you to take every care to avoid whatever might alter our relations with that nation and its Government.  The agents of the French republic in the United States should forbid themselves whatever might even remotely lead to a rupture.  In ordinary communication, every step should show the benevolent disposition and mutual friendship which animate the chiefs