In June Gallatin was satisfied of the general hostile spirit of Great Britain and of its wish to inflict serious injury on the United States. He notified Monroe of his opinion and warned him that the most favorable terms to be expected were the _status ante bellum_, and not certainly that, unless the American people were united and the country able to stand the shock of the campaign. Mr. Madison's administration had already humbled itself to an abandonment, or at least to an adjournment, of the principle to establish which they had resorted to arms. But in the first stages of the negotiation it was clear that the British cabinet had more serious and dangerous objects in view, and looked beyond aggression and temporary injury to permanent objects. At the first meeting on August 8, the British commissioners demanded, as a preliminary to any negotiation, that the United States should set apart to the Indian tribes the entire territory of the Northwest to be held by them forever in sovereignty under the guaranty of Great Britain. The absurdity of such a demand is sufficient evidence that it was never seriously entertained. There could have been no idea that the military power of Great Britain was able to enforce, or that the United States would abjectly submit to, such a mutilation of its territory and such a limitation of its expansion. Behind this cover Mr. Gallatin instinctively detected the real design of the cabinet to be the conquest of New Orleans and the mouths of the Mississippi. If to the territory thus acquired that of Florida should be added by cession from Spain, which could hardly refuse any compensation asked of her by Great Britain in return for the liberation of the Peninsula, a second British dominion would be set up on the American continent. These views Gallatin communicated to Monroe in a private dispatch of August 20, 1814, by the hands of Mr. Dallas. To the _sine qua non_ of the British commissioners no answer was made by the Americans. The negotiation was abruptly suspended, and only by informal conversation was Mr. Goulburn given to understand that reference had been had to America for instructions. Mr. Gallatin was of opinion that the negotiations were at an end, and in his despair of peace took consolation in the belief that the insolence of the demand would unite America from Maine to Georgia in defense of her rights, of her territory, and indeed of her independence. The American commissioners made no secret of their belief that their mission was closed. Two of the secretaries started from Ghent on a continental tour, and notice was given to the landlord of the house where the commissioners resided of their intention to quit it on October 1. On August 2, while matters were still at this deadlock, Lord Castlereagh passed through Ghent on his way to the Congress at Vienna. Goulburn was ordered to change his tone and Lord Liverpool was advised to moderate his demands; to use Castlereagh's words, to "a letting down of the