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x history of the eighteenth century has been given in the Appendices to the Reports of the Historical MSS. Commission, to the authors of which every student of the period must desire to acknowledge his gratitude in unstinted terms. Where necessary, reference is made in the notes to these Reports.

In renewing the expression of my debt of gratitude recorded in the Preface in the first edition to those whose co-operation so materially lightened my task, I desire to record my sense of the help which I have since received from Mr. C. W. Alvord, Associate Professor of History in the University of Illinois, in regard to the "western policy" of the British Government in America from 1763 to 1772, a subject which he has made his own; and to Mr. John Jay in regard to several points in the history of the negotiations at Paris in 1782-1783. To Mr. Alvord I also owe the letter from Lord Shelburne to Major William Jackson, which will be found in the note to page 202 of the second volume. I also wish to thank Mr. G. R. A. FitzGerald, K.C., for the valuable assistance which I have received from him in the preparation of this edition.

Since the appearance of the first edition of this book numerous publications bearing specially on the negotiations of 1782-1783 have appeared both in England and in America. A bibliography will be found in the Appendix to Mr. Fiske's Critical Period of American History, published in 1888. To the books mentioned by him, the recently published papers of Caleb Whitefoord are to be added. The work of Monsieur Doniol, Histoire de la participation de la France à l'Établissement des États Unis