Here was the first proposition of _set-off_. On the one side were “indemnities due by France to citizens of the United States,” and on the other side were “privileges and rights” under the treaties; but it will not fail to be remarked that _the indemnities due by France were to be paid by the United States_. This proposition proceeded on the idea that the counter-claims of France were at least equal in value to the claims of the United States, and that the release of the former was a sufficient consideration for the assumption of the latter. But this was entirely beyond the powers of the American plenipotentiaries, who, in their reply, pronounced it “inadmissible.”[190] It revealed the desire of France to escape any payment of money, as only a few days later was openly avowed by the French plenipotentiaries, “giving as one reason the utter inability of France to pay, in the situation in which she would be left by the present war.”[191] This declared inability served to explain the difficulties encountered by the American plenipotentiaries. Evidently there was a “foregone conclusion” against any payment by France. The counter-claims furnished the needed _substitute_. But, as these were “national,” while the claims of the United States were “individual,” there could be no just _set-off_ between them, unless the American Government assured to its citizens the payment of what was due from France, according to the proposition of the French plenipotentiaries. The American plenipotentiaries were disheartened. Nothing in their instructions enabled them to meet the new and unexpected turn of affairs. The treaty they had striven for seemed to elude their grasp. In their journal, under date of September 13, 1800, is the record, that, “being now convinced that the door was perfectly closed against all hope of obtaining indemnities with any modifications of the treaties, it only remained to be determined whether, under all circumstances, it would not be expedient to attempt _a temporary arrangement_.”[192] The French plenipotentiaries did not consider this proposition, without insisting, “first, that a stipulation of indemnities carries with it the full and entire admission of the treaties, and, secondly, that the relinquishment of the advantages and privileges stipulated by the treaties, by means of the reciprocal relinquishment of indemnities, would prove to be the most advantageous arrangement, and also the most honorable to the two nations.”[193] Here, again, was a proposition of _set-off_, which was repeated in other different forms.