Sir,
The Court of Petersburg, is very industrious in its endeavors to accomplish a separate peace between England and Holland. Her Minister at Versailles has made an insinuation to the French Court, that her Majesty would be much obliged to the King, if he would not make any further opposition to such a separate peace. To this insinuation, the following wise and firm answer has been given by the Court of France.
"The King is sensibly impressed with the fresh proof of confidence, which the Empress has given in communicating to him her measures and ideas respecting a separate peace between England and the States-General. His Majesty perceives therein the sentiments of humanity, which actuate her Imperial Majesty, and he takes the earliest opportunity to answer, with the same degree of freedom, what particularly concerns him in the verbal insinuations communicated by Prince Baratinski.
"Faithful to the rule he has established, of never controlling the conduct of any power, the King has not sought to direct the deliberations of the States-General, either to incline them to war, or to prevent them from making a separate peace; England having unexpectedly attacked the Provinces of the United Netherlands, his Majesty hastened to prevent the ill consequences by every means in his power; his services have been gratuitous, his Majesty has never exacted any acknowledgment on their part. Should the States-General think that the obligations they owe to his Majesty, as well as the interest of the Republic, impose it on them as a duty, not to separate their cause from the King's and his allies, the Empress of Russia is too wise and too just not to acknowledge, that it is not for his Majesty to divert them from such a resolution, and that all that he can do, is to refer to their wisdom, to conclude on what best suits with their situation.
"The Empress is not ignorant, that circumstances have induced the States-General to concert operations with the King. His Majesty flatters himself, that this Princess has no views of prevailing on them to desist from this arrangement, which necessarily results from the position of the two powers with respect to England, and which must naturally contribute to the re-establishment of the general tranquillity, the object both of her Imperial Majesty's and the King's wishes."
I have the honor to be, &c.
JOHN ADAMS.
TO ROBERT R. LIVINGSTON.
The Hague, June 15th, 1782.
Sir,