While the House was abandoning itself to reckless mischief-making, Washington was striving to arrange matters by negotiation. The perplexities of his situation were great and varied. As a military man he knew that American jurisdiction was precarious so long as Great Britain held the interior. The matter had been the subject of prolix correspondence between Jefferson and Hammond, but the American demands that Great Britain should surrender the frontier posts in accordance with the treaty of peace had been met by demands that America, in accordance with that same treaty, should first satisfy various claims of British subjects for restitution, indemnity, and relief. The regular diplomatic machinery stuck fast at this point, both at home and abroad. In one of his gossipy, confidential letters Fisher Ames remarked that Hammond was a most "petulant, impudent" man, habitually railing against the conduct of our government "with a gabble that his feelings render doubly unintelligible." But Pinckney, our representative in England, was equally undiplomatic. He was "sour and also Gallican"; although calm in manner, "he had prejudices, and unless a man has a mind above them, he can do little service there." Washington decided that it would be wise to send a special envoy to deal with all the points at issue. He thought first of Hamilton, but was warned that the Senate would not ratify such an appointment. Hamilton recommended John Jay as "the only man in whose qualifications for success there would be thorough confidence." Jay was then chief-justice, but the crisis was so dangerous as to justify Washington in calling him even from that important post. He had matchless qualifications for the mission. He had been minister to Spain, 1778-1782; he had been one of the commissioners who had negotiated the treaty of peace of 1783; he had been Secretary of Foreign Affairs, 1784-1789; so that he had had an experience which familiarized him with every detail of the questions at issue. As a negotiator he had always gained marked success by acting upon his own principle that "a little good-natured wisdom often does more in politics than much slippery craft." Jay showed fine patriotism in accepting the appointment. He remarked to his friends that no man could frame a treaty with Great Britain without making himself unpopular and odious and he accepted the mission under "a conviction that to refuse it would be to desert my duty for the sake of my ease and domestic concerns and comforts."