On the 20th, the administration of Lord North terminated, and the advocates of peace and American independence immediately came into power, the Marquis of Rockingham being at the head of the ministry. Hopes of some possible accommodation were entertained, by Lord Shelburne and his party, according to Lord Chatham’s ideas. Overtures were made to Adams at the Hague, and to Franklin at Paris, to ascertain whether the United States would agree to a separate peace, and to something short of the entire recognition of their independence. Sir Guy Carleton, who was appointed to supersede Sir Henry Clinton, was commissioned to treat for peace. He addressed, therefore, a pacific letter to Washington, and put a stop to the predatory incursions of the loyalist Indians, which had been long the scourge of the New York frontiers. Powers to treat were communicated to congress; but that body declined to negotiate except in conjunction with France, and at Paris. Franklin also had returned for answer, through Richard Oswald, a British merchant who had formerly large commercial dealings with America, and who had been sent to Paris for the purpose of sounding him, that nothing short of independence, satisfactory boundaries, and a participation in the fisheries, would be admitted as the foundation for a treaty. On July 1st, Lord Rockingham died, and Lord Shelburne succeeded him. The views of the king were now strengthened by his minister’s disinclination for the dismemberment of the empire. Rodney had captured nearly the whole fleet of De Grasse in the West Indies, and England was again triumphant in the western hemisphere. Nevertheless the king, in proroguing parliament on July 11th, spoke of his anxious wish for peace. In August, an act of parliament was obtained, authorising a negotiation with America, and Oswald returned to France, to treat with the American agents and commissioners, Franklin, Adams and Jay. Difficulties arose immediately. The commissioners were authorised to conclude a peace with the agents of certain Colonies. Jay objected, and refused to proceed until Oswald came empowered to treat with the agents of the “United States of America.” This objection being overcome, others had arisen in the meantime. The French minister, Vergennes, from what motive does not exactly appear—perhaps from not being wholly favourable to the new republic—while he instigated the Americans to insist on their share of the Newfoundland fishery, urged the British government not to make the concession. The British agents, however, aware of the double dealing of Vergennes, exposed it, and satisfied the American commissioners that in this respect nothing was to be feared; and no time was lost in bringing the treaty to a conclusion. On the 30th of November, therefore, the preliminaries of the articles of peace were signed at a private meeting unknown to Vergennes, although this proceeding was contrary to their original treaty with France and the late orders of congress.