constituted the only prison of our British and Hessian captives. Some day a nation will not call itself respectable which does not obey the precept of the Model Treaty on this head. And why should we not hope to see the day when Article XVII shall be in effect? That Article read:

"If the citizens or subjects of either party, in danger from tempests, pirates, or other accidents, shall take refuge with their vessels within the harbors or jurisdiction of the other, they shall be received, protected, and treated with humanity and kindness, and shall be permitted to furnish themselves at reasonable prices, with all the refreshments, provisions, and other things necessary for their subsistence, health, and accommodation, and for the repairs of their vessels."

Are not people anyhow somewhat too prone to call humanly attainable things "visionary"? Was not old George Washington practical? He said of that draft of a treaty that it "marks a new era in negotiation," and "old Frederick of Prussia," as Jefferson calls him, was a right hard-headed old fellow, and he entered into a treaty with us containing substantially these things. Let us not take for granted that people, who want to improve the world and make nations treat one another just as civilized gentlemen treat one another, are necessarily vision-seeers. May be, it might be wiser to drop one e, and call them seers instead?

Parton says, and I cannot make up my mind whether he says it in derision or in earnest:

"In short, the commission to negotiate commercial treaties had but one important result, namely, the composition of the draft of the treaty and its preservation in the Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States against the time when nations shall want it."

May God speed the coming of the time, and may God equally speed the cessation of talk about such a time as "impracticable" and "visionary!" If, as he says, the treaty "remains only as an admonition and a prophecy," it is at least an admonition Godward, because Peaceward; and a prophecy which will be fulfilled, if the world grows from mere civilization to that enlightenment, where "the common sense of most" can "hold a fretful realm in awe.'

Jefferson had made an excellent foreign minister. In the transaction of his official duties and of those extra official duties, which consume so much of a foreign minister's time, he had been patient, tactful, courteous and wise. His dispatches home are among the greatest state papers which we have. He had shown himself in France, as earlier in Virginia and later at Philadelphia and Washington, an excellent judge of men. Even Judge Marshall, who hated him, says: "and in that situation" (that is, as Minister to France) "he acquitted himself much to the public satisfaction."

Later Webster, who had no great use for Jefferson, speaking of his services abroad, says: "No court in Europe had at that time in Paris a representative commanding or enjoying higher regard, for political knowledge, or for general attainments, than the minister of this then infant republic."

The contemporaneous Edinburgh Review referred to his "watchfulness on every subject," his perseverance, his skill and knowledge, as not suffering in comparison even with Franklin's diplomatic talents, and to his public letters as "excelling in excellence an equal

twelve month's letters from any British Ambassador."

But it was as Secretary of State and President that Jefferson left a lasting impress on this Government's International Relations.

On his way from Norfolk to Monticello after he had landed in America, he received the letter from General Washington offering him the place of Secretary of State, really then, as now, the Cabinet Premiership. Jefferson reluctantly forewent his desire to remain in the diplomatic service and accepted. He arrived in New York, after a visit on the way to his old friend Benjamin Franklin, and immediately took up the three months arrears of work in the Department of State.

As almost the first thing, the reader may compare, certainly with credit to Jefferson, not only in point of patriotism, but in point of prescience, his words, as Secretary of State, asserting the right of navigation of the Mississippi River with its subsequent tame surrender for twenty-five years by Jay, as Foreign Minister, and by Washington, as President, in the memorable Jay Treaty.

Jefferson's letters of instruction to Carmichael and Short on this subject are instructive and interesting, especially in this: that he based our claim not only on the Treaty of Paris of '63 and the Treaty of 1782-83, but characteristically upon the announcement of an "abstract proposition," to wit: that "the right to a thing gives a right to the means without which the thing can not be used." He calls this a "still broader and more unquestionable ground," than the treaty grounds, and adds that, "if the right of the upper inhabitants to

descend a stream is in any case obstructed, it is but an act of force by a stronger society against a weaker, and is condemned by the judgment of mankind."

Anticipating that Spain might make the argument, that, if she granted the navigation of the Mississippi to the United States, she must likewise, under the "most favored nation" clause of her treaties, grant it to others, he denies that the most favored nation clause could be invoked, because "Spain does not grant us the navigation of the river; we have an inherent right to it."

On the 24th of April the first Federal precedent of our position to be taken in matters of extradition was settled, and our time-honored policy with regard to political offenses was initiated. An extract from Jefferson's instructions will explain itself. The reader will see from reading it that this, too, was the beginning of a permanent policy on the part of our Government:

"Treason. This, when real, merits the highest punishment. But most codes extend their definitions of treason to acts not really against one's country. They do not distinguish between acts against the government and acts against the oppressions of the government; the latter are virtues; yet they have furnished more victims to the executioner than the former; because real treasons are rare; oppressions frequent. The unsuccessful strugglers against tyranny, have been the chief martyrs of treason laws of all countries.

"Reformation of government with our neighbors, being as much wanted now as reformation of religion is, or ever was anywhere, we should not wish, then, to give up to the executioner, the patriot who fails, and flees to us. Treasons, then taking the simulated with the real-are sufficiently punished by exile."

Soon after, Jefferson had to meet, for the first time in our history, another troublesome question: the question of how far the dual character of our republic must be

considered by foreign nations in the interpretation of treaties with the United States. The United States had undertaken to secure that there should be no legal obstructions to the collections of debts due to British subjects. The British had cause to complain, because there were obstructions in the State Statutes, and they were holding our frontier forts until we had complied with the treaty, in the way that they construed it.

Upon this question Jefferson and Hamilton came into clash. Jefferson was requested to put his views in writing and hand them to the President, which was done. In this paper he took the position that the British Government must have understood beforehand the dual nature of our institutions; what would be the force and extent of a Federal power; and that any interference with the States by the United States, as a Government, must be, to use his own language, “not a matter of obligation, or coercion, but of persuasion and influence merely," as the United States Government under our system had not power to control State Legislatures or State Courts, and could not be taken to have stipulated in the treaty to do what it could not do; that the Government had observed the treaty to the extent of its power by making recommendations and by using all its influence. This precedent, too, all intelligent Presidents and Secretaries of State have since followed.

Jefferson, being our first Secretary of State, his acts and utterances, have had a more permanent effect upon our history with regard to international affairs than those of any other man. In many matters he was overridden by the Cabinet, but not with regard to