[Footnote 547:  Russell Papers.  Cowley to Russell.  Private.  Jan. 17, 1862.  On this same date Thouvenel, writing to Flahault in London, hoped England would feel that she had a common interest with France in preventing Mexico from falling under the yoke of Americans either “unis ou secedes.” (Thouvenel, Le Secret de l’Empereur, II, 226).]

[Footnote 548:  Ibid., Jan. 24, 1862.]

[Footnote 549:  Ibid., March 6, 1862.]

[Footnote 550:  F.O., Am., Vol. 825.  No. 146.  Lyons to Russell, Feb. 28, 1862.  The fact that Slidell arrived in France just as Napoleon’s plans for Mexico took clearer form has been made the ground for assumptions that he immediately gave assurance of Southern acquiescence and encouraged Napoleon to go forward.  I have found no good evidence of this—­rather the contrary.  The whole plan was clear to Cowley by mid-January before Slidell reached Paris, and Slidell’s own correspondence shows no early push on Mexico.  The Confederate agents’ correspondence, both official and private, will be much used later in this work and here requires explanation.  But four historical works of importance deal with it extensively, (1) Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Confederacy, 2 vols., 1905, purports to include the despatches of Mason and Slidell to Richmond, but is very unsatisfactory.  Important despatches are missing, and elisions sometimes occur without indication. (2) Virginia Mason, The Public Life and Diplomatic Correspondence of James M. Mason, 1906, contains most of Mason’s despatches, including some not given by Richardson.  The author also used the Mason Papers (see below). (3) Callahan, The Diplomatic History of the Southern Confederacy, 1901, is the most complete and authoritative work on Southern diplomacy yet published.  He used the collection known as the “Pickett Papers,” for official despatches, supplementing these when gaps occurred by a study of the Mason Papers, but his work, narrative in form, permits no extended printing of documents. (4) L.M.  Sears, A Confederate Diplomat at the Court of Napoleon III. (Am.  Hist.  Rev. Jan., 1921), is a study drawn from Slidell’s private letters in the Mason Papers.  The Mason Papers exist in eight folios or packages in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress, and in addition there is one bound volume of Mason’s despatches to Richmond.  These contain the private correspondence of Mason and Slidell while in Europe.  Slidell’s letters are originals.  Mason’s letters are copies in Slidell’s hand-writing, made apparently at Mason’s request and sent to him in May, 1865.  A complete typed copy of this correspondence was taken by me in 1913, but this has not hitherto been used save in a manuscript Master’s degree thesis by Walter M. Case, “James M. Mason, Confederate Diplomat,” Stanford University, 1915, and for a few citations by C. F. Adams, A Crisis in Downing Street (Mass.  Hist.  Soc. Proceedings, May, 1914).  The Mason Papers also contain many letters from Mason’s English friends, Spence, Lindsay, Gregory and others.]