PURCHASE   OF  THE  TERRITORY   OF  LOUISIANA.            291
Remarks on Signing the Treaty.
Mr. Marbois said: As soon as they had signed they rose, shook
hands, and Livingston, expressing the satisfaction of all, said: "The
treaty we have, signed has not been brought about by pressure nor
dictated by force. Equally advantageous to both the contracting
parties, it will change vast solitudes into a flourishing country. \To-day
the United States take their place among the Powers of the first rank.
Moreover, if wars are inevitable, France will have in the new world
a friend increasing year by year in power, which cannot fail to become
puissant and respected on all the seas of the earth. These treaties
will become a guarantee of peace and good will between commercial
States. The instrument we have signed will cause no tears to flow.
It will prepare centuries of happiness for innumerable generations of
the human race. The Mississippi and the Missouri will see them
prosper and increase in the midst of equality, under just laws, freed
from the errors of superstition, from the scourges of bad government,
and truly* worthy- of the regard and care of Providence."
[Extract.]
Mr. Madison to Dr, J. W. Francis.
Montpelier, Nov'' 7, 1831.
The friendly relations in which I stood to both Chancellor Liv-
ingston and Mr. Monroe would make me a reluctant witness, if I had
happened to possess any knowledge of facts favoring either at the
expense of the other in the negotiations which preceded the transfer
of Louisiana to the United States. But my recollections throw no
light on the subject beyond what may be derived from official papers
in print, or on the files of the Department of State, and especially in
the work on Louisiana by Mr. Marbois, the French negotiator. I have
no doubt that each of the envoys did everything, according to his
opportunities, that could evince official zeal and anxious patriotism;
at the same time that the disclosures of Mr. Marbois sufficiently shew
that the real cause of success is to be found in the sudden policy sug-
gested to Napoleon by the foreseen rupture of the peace of Amiens,
and, as a consequence, the seizure of Louisiana by Great Britain, who
would not only deprive France of her acquisition, but turn it, polit
ically and commercially, against her, in relation to the United States
or Spanish America.