Mr. Dayton to Mr. Seward
Sir: Your despatches from No. 320 to No. 330, both inclusive, are received.
Mr. Kasson, commissioner from the United States to the postal convention to be held at Paris, likewise arrived, and delivered your letters. All proper notices have been given to the departments here, and I shall of course do everything in my power to render his mission useful and agreeable.
I saw Mr. Drouyn de l’Huys yesterday, and spoke with him about the loan of eight millions of francs, said to have been negotiated here in behalf of the rebels. He said that he had heard nothing of it, and did not believe it. He made a memorandum of the statement, and said he would endeavor to ascertain the facts, and would let me know if he learned anything further; and he wished me likewise to apprize him if I should in future ascertain more distinctly the truth or falsity of the report. He added that he could see no reason why an outsider (to whom no debt from the confederates was due) should be willing to advance money anew, on an engagement by the confederates to deliver cotton, at sixpence sterling per pound, at a seaport in the United States within six months after peace; that when peace occurred the purchase of cotton would be free, and sixpence sterling was rather beyond the ordinary price of cotton; that the only inducement to advance money anew would be to get cotton now, when it was so much needed, and this agreement did not seem to contemplate that. I told him, what I have heretofore said to you, that the existing conditions in England had managed in this way to get “bonds to bearer,” or something negotiable for the debts due from the rebels, and having a seeming cotton security and much southern sympathy to back them, they would be able to put them off upon ignorant purchasers. This, I take it, constitutes the modus operandi. I took occasion to say to him that it was not to be supposed that the government of the United States would recognize the validity of the confederate title to cotton, or the title of any person got from the confederates.
Having received a note from Mr. Adams in reference to his late certificate to Messrs. Howell and Zirman, I took occasion, at his request, to say informally to Mr. Drouyn de l’Huys that he (Mr. Adams) expressly disclaimed all hostility to the French government, and all of the unfriendly motives attributed to him, in the late memoranda which had been left with me.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, &c.