on giving due security, were allowed to proceed to any neutral port.  Of course the price of provisions in France and in England was materially different, and a lucrative traffic for the United States was, in this way, destroyed.  Moreover, this proceeding was a comparative novelty in the law of nations, and, however it might suit the purposes of Great Britain, it was a gross outrage on America.  In November of the same year, it was followed by a still more glaring infraction of the rights of neutrals, in an order, condemning to capture and adjudication all vessels laden with the produce of any French colony, or with supplies for such a colony.

The fermentation in consequence of this order rose to such a height in America, that it required all the skill of Washington to avert a war.  The president, however, determining to preserve peace if possible, despatched Jay to London as a minister plenipotentiary, by whose frank explanations, redress was in a measure obtained for the past, and a treaty negotiated, not, indeed, adequate to justice, but better than could be obtained again, when it expired in 1806.

The relaxation in the rigor of the order of November, 1793, soon proved to be more nominal than real; and from 1794 until the peace of Amiens in 1802, the commerce of the United States continued to be the prey of British cruisers and privateers.  After the renewal of the war, the fury of the belligerents increased, and with it the stringent measures adopted by Napoleon and Great Britain.  The French Emperor, boldly avowing his intention to crush England, forbade by a series of decrees, issued from Berlin, Milan and Rambouillet, the importation of her commodities into any part of Europe under his control; and England, equally sweeping in her acts, declared all such ports in a state of blockade, thus rendering any neutral vessel liable to capture, which should attempt to enter them.  The legality of a blockade, where there is not a naval power off the coast competent to maintain such blockade, has always been denied by the lesser maritime powers.  Its effect, in the present instance, was virtually to exclude the United States from foreign commerce.  In these extreme measures, Napoleon and England were equally censured; but the policy of the latter affected the Americans far more than the former.  The exasperation against Great Britain became extreme and pervaded the whole community; that against France was slighter and confined to the more intelligent.  Napoleon was first to begin these outrages on the rights of neutrals; but his injustice was practically felt only on land; while England was first to introduce the paper blockade, a measure ruinous to American merchants.  This was finally done on May 16, 1806, when Great Britain announced a “blockade of the coast rivers and ports, from the river Elbe to the port of Brest inclusive.”  On the 21st of November, of the same year, Napoleon in retaliation, issued a decree from Berlin, placing the British Islands in a state of blockade.  This decree was followed by a still more stringent order in council on the part of England.