The British Parliament was to be prorogued on September 5, and, unless an announcement could be made in the Queen's Speech that a settlement had been arrived at, war, it was generally felt, could scarcely be avoided. Even M. Guizot began to realize that, if the peace was to be preserved, he must propose some form of reparation. On several occasions Jarnac had hinted that the British government might very possibly be satisfied, were a pecuniary indemnity to be offered to Mr. Pritchard.[795] Unquestionably, the payment of a sum of money would be regarded in France as less objectionable than most other forms of reparation. But, having proposed to the King and the Cabinet that the affair should be settled on those lines, and having obtained their assent, M. Guizot still deferred transmitting an offer of pecuniary compensation to London. In a despatch, dated August 29, a copy of which was to be given to Lord Aberdeen, he stoutly maintained the right of the authorities at Tahiti to expel Mr. Pritchard from the island. His imprisonment, however, and certain other acts of which M. d'Aubigny had been guilty, could not be defended, and that officer would, in consequence, receive in due course a notification of the censure which the government had passed upon his conduct. He could concede no more, he told Lord Cowley, and he fully intended to retire from office, if further redress were to be demanded.[796] Nevertheless, he appears privately to have informed M. de Jarnac that he was transmitting a second despatch, containing an offer of a money payment to Mr. Pritchard, which he was to communicate to Lord Aberdeen, should the British government regard the reprimand, administered to M. d'Aubigny, as an inadequate reparation. This, as he doubtless expected, was the view taken of his first despatch by the Cabinet in London. Jarnac, in consequence, lost no time in assuring Lord Aberdeen that an offer of a pecuniary indemnity would be made. Had he not taken this responsibility upon himself, he was convinced that the customary announcement that "friendly relations existed with other countries" would have been omitted from the Queen's Speech, and "the whole of Europe would have been thrown into a state of perturbation." On the following day, September 4, he placed in the hands of Lord Aberdeen the official offer of the French government to indemnify Mr. Pritchard by the payment of a sum of money, the amount of which was to be determined by the admirals commanding the French and British fleets in the Pacific. Aberdeen pronounced the proposed satisfaction "rather slender," but assured him that he might now consider the matter as settled.[797] Twenty-four hours later Parliament was prorogued, and the happy termination of the Pritchard affair was announced in the Speech from the Throne. "The danger," wrote Queen Victoria to the King of the Belgians, had been "imminent."[798]