“After dinner I got into conversation with them and with Mr. Thornton, when America again became the topic.  They asked me a great many questions respecting America which I answered to the best of my ability.  They at length asked me if I did not think that the ruling party in America was very much under French influence.  I replied ‘No’; that I believed on the contrary that nine tenths of the American people were prepossessed strongly in favor of this country.  As a proof I urged the universal prevalence of English fashions in preference to French, and English manners and customs; the universal rejoicings on the success of the English over the French; the marked attention shown to English travellers and visitors; the neglect with which they treated their own literary productions on account of the strong prejudice in favor of English works; that everything, in short, was enhanced in its value by having attached to it the name English.

“On the other hand, I told them that the French were a people almost universally despised in America, and by at least one half hated.  As in England, they were esteemed the common enemies of mankind; that French fashions were discountenanced and loathed; that a Frenchman was considered as a man always to be suspected; that young men were forbidden by their parents, in many instances, to associate with them, they considering their company and habits as tending to subvert their morals, and to render them frivolous and insincere.  I added that in America as well as everywhere else there were bad men, men of no principles, whose consciences never stand in the way of their ambition or avarice; but that I firmly believed that, as a body, the American Congress was as pure from corruption and foreign influence as any body of men in the world.  They were much pleased with what I told them, and acknowledged that America and American visitors generally had been treated with too much contempt and neglect.

“In the course of the day I asked Mr. Thornton what were the objects that the English Government had in view when they laid the Orders in Council.  He told me in direct terms, ‘the Universal monopoly of Commerce’; that they had long desired an excuse for such measures as the Orders in Council, and that the French decrees were exactly what they wished, and the opportunity was seized with avidity the moment it was offered.  They knew that the Orders in Council bore hard upon the Americans, but they considered that as merely incidental.

“To this I replied that, if such was the case as he represented it, what blame could be attached to the American Government for declaring war?  He said that it was urged that America ought to have considered the circumstances of the case, and that Great Britain was fighting for the liberties of the world; that America was, in a great degree, interested in the decision of the contest, and that she ought to be content to suffer a little.