Perplexed and indignant, the United States constituted a special mission of three eminent citizens, Mr. Pinckney, Mr. Marshall, and Mr. Gerry, who were charged to secure indemnity for these spoliations. In his elaborate instructions, dated July 15, 1797, the Secretary of State, Mr. Pickering, lays down the following rule of conduct: “In respect to the depredations on our commerce, the principal objects will be to agree on an equitable mode of examining and deciding the claims of our citizens, and the manner and periods of making them compensation.… The proposed mode of adjusting those claims, by commissioners appointed on each side, is so perfectly fair, we cannot imagine that it will be refused.” Although this reparation was not made “an indispensable condition of the proposed treaty,” yet the plenipotentiaries were enjoined “not to renounce these claims of our citizens, _nor to stipulate that they be assumed by the United States as a loan to the French Government_.”[134] Thus fully were these claims recognized at the time by our Government, and most carefully placed under the protection of our plenipotentiary triumvirate. The triumvirate found the French Republic in no mood of justice. Bonaparte was then triumphant at the head of the army of Italy, and Talleyrand was exhibiting his remarkable powers at the head of the foreign relations of France. Victory had given confidence, and the exulting Republic was standing tiptoe, more disposed to strike than negotiate, unless it could dictate, and implacable always towards England and all supposed to sympathize with that power. After exactions and humiliations hard to bear, the plenipotentiaries were compelled to return home without any official reception by the intoxicated Government to which they were accredited, but not before they had encountered the masterly ability of Talleyrand, who, in reply to their statement of the claims of the United States, presented the counter claims of France. Though in Paris merely on sufferance, they had unofficial interviews with various agents of the Republic, and even with Talleyrand himself; but without dwelling on details not pertinent to the occasion, it is enough to say, that, while refusing to offer a loan or bribe, they were able to declare frankly “that France had taken violently from America more than fifteen millions of dollars, and treated us in every respect as enemies”;[135] and also to receive from Talleyrand a concession, recorded in one of their despatches, that “some of those claims were probably just,” with the inquiry, “whether, if they were acknowledged by France, we could not give a credit as to the payment,--say, for two years?”[136] Here again was an admission not to be forgotten.