CONGRESS expired; Monroe set sail March 8, 1803; Washington relapsed into silence; and the President and his Cabinet waited alone in the empty village, triumphing for the moment over their difficulties. Although a French prefect was actually in New Orleans, and the delivery of Louisiana to Bonaparte might from day to day be expected, not an additional soldier stood on the banks of the Mississippi, and the States of Kentucky and Tennessee were as quiet as though their flat-boats still floated down to New Orleans. A month passed before Madison or Jefferson again moved. Then the President asked his Cabinet[1] what Monroe should do in case France, as he expressed it, “refused our rights.” He proposed an alliance with England, and suggested three inducements which might be offered to Great Britain: “1. Not to make a separate peace. 2. To let her take Louisiana. 3. Commercial privileges.” The Cabinet unanimously rejected the second and third concessions, but Dearborn and Lincoln were alone in opposing the first; and a majority agreed to instruct Monroe and Livingston, “as soon as they find that no arrangements can be made with France, to use all possible procrastination with them, and in the mean time enter into conferences with the British government, through their ambassador at Paris, to fix principles of alliance, and leave us in peace till Congress meets; and prevent war till next spring.” Madison wrote the instructions. If the French government, he said,[2] should meditate hostilities against the United States, or force a war by closing the Mississippi, the two envoys were to invite England to an alliance, and were to negotiate a treaty stipulating that neither party should make peace or truce without consent of the other. Should France deny the right of deposit without disputing the navigation, the envoys were to make no positive engagement, but should let Congress decide between immediate war or further procrastination.