Another British minister, James Jackson, was received October 1, and began his negotiation by asserting that Madison had tricked Erskine into signing an agreement which the American government knew he was not authorized to make. The charge was denied, and his relations were finally closed on November 8 by a note in which he was informed that inasmuch as he "had used a language which cannot be understood but as reiterating and even aggravating the same gross insinuation, no further communications will be received." Having thus practically been dismissed for brutally insulting the government to which he was accredited, Jackson made a tour of the Eastern States, and was received with hospitality and enthusiasm by the leading New England Federalists. [Sidenote: Macon Bill No. 2.] [Sidenote: Anger of France.] [Sidenote: Pretended revocation by France.] From France no satisfaction could be obtained during 1809. To remove all restrictions on commerce was to give up everything; but Congress was tired of resistance, and on May i, 1810, passed the "Macon Bill No. 2," which was practically a surrender of all the principles at stake. It provided that commerce should be free, but that if either England or France should withdraw her Orders or Decrees, intercourse should be prohibited with the nation which retained them. The probable effect on France was speedily seen by the publication of a Decree which had been issued March 23, 1810: it declared that all American vessels which had entered French ports after the date of the Non-Intercourse Act of 1809 were to be seized. This was practically an act of war. The Macon bill now suggested to the Emperor that the Americans might be entrapped into another ambush: on August 5 his foreign minister wrote to Armstrong, the American minister, that "the Emperor loves the Americans," and that he would revoke the Milan and Berlin Decrees from November 1, provided England would withdraw her Orders in Council. Five days earlier the secret Decree of the Trianon had ordered the seizure of all American vessels that might reach French ports. The object of these measures was to entice American vessels within the reach of the French, and the ruse was successful. November 1 the President issued a proclamation declaring trade with England suspended because France had withdrawn her Decrees. Then ensued a long diplomatic discussion: since captures of American vessels by French cruisers continued, the British government refused to admit that the Decrees had been withdrawn, and complained of the prohibition of English trade. On December 25 Napoleon drew in his net by a general order for the seizure of all American vessels in French ports; and property to the value of about ten million dollars was thus confiscated. [Sidenote: Fruitless negotiation with England.]