Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams .

No. 4.]

Sir: A despatch has just been received from Mr. Dallas, dated the 9th of April instant, the record of which (No. 330) you doubtless will find in the archives of the legation when you shall have arrived at London.

[Page 83]

In that paper Mr. Dallas states that he had had a conversation with Lord John Russell, the minister of foreign affairs of her Britannic Majesty’s government, on the subject of a protest against any recognition of the so-called Confederate States of America, the protest having been presented to him by Mr. Dallas, in obedience to a circular letter of instructions sent to him from this department, under the date of the 9th ultimo.

Mr. Dallas represents that his lordship assured him, with great earnestness, that there was not the slightest disposition in the British government to grasp at any advantage which might be supposed to arise from the unpleasant domestic differences in the United States; but, on the contrary, that they would be highly gratified if those differences were adjusted, and the Union restored to its former unbroken position.

This, by itself, would be very gratifying to the President. Mr. Dallas, however, adds that he endeavored to impress upon his lordship how important it must be that Great Britain and France should abstain, at least for a considerable time, from doing what, by encouraging groundless hopes, would widen a breach still thought capable of being closed; but that his lordshid seemed to think the matter not ripe for decision one way or the other, and remarked that what he had already said was all that at present it was in his power to say.

When you shall have read the instructions at large which have been sent to you, you will hardly need to be told that these last remarks of his lordship are by no means satisfactory to this government. Her Britannic Majesty’s government is at liberty to choose whether it will retain the friendship of this government by refusing all aid and comfort to its enemies, now in flagrant rebellion against it, as we think the treaties existing between the two countries require, or whether the government of her Majesty will take the precarious benefits of a different course.

You will lose no time in making known to her Britannic Majesty’s government that the President regards the answer of his lordship as possibly indicating a policy that this government would be obliged to deem injurious to its rights and derogating from its dignity.

I am, sir, respectfully, your obedient servant,

WILLIAM H. SEWARD.

C. F. Adams, Esq.,
&c., &c., &c.