ng abroad, and the mere hint of such a project was enough to throw
the West into a fever of excitement. Moreover, at this moment, before
the treaty between France and Spain had been consummated, Morales, the
Intendant of New Orleans, deliberately threw down the gage of battle to
the Westerners. [Footnote: Gayarre, III., 456.] On October 16, 1802, he
proclaimed that the Americans had forfeited their right of deposit in
New Orleans. By Pinckney's treaty this right had been granted for three
years, with the stipulation that it should then be extended for a longer
period, and that if the Spaniards chose to revoke the permit so far as
New Orleans was concerned, they should make some other spot on the river
a port of free entry. The Americans had taken for granted that the
privilege when once conferred would never be withdrawn; but Morales,
under pretence that the Americans had slept on their rights by failing
to discover some other spot as a treaty port, declared that the right of
deposit had lapsed, and would not be renewed. The Governor, Salcedo--who
had succeeded Gayoso, when the latter died of yellow fever, complicated
by a drinking-bout with Wilkinson--was not in sympathy with the
movement; but this mattered little. Under the cumbrous Spanish colonial
system, the Governor, though he disapproved of the actions of the
Intendant, could not reverse them, and Morales paid no heed to the angry
protests of the Spanish Minister at Washington, who saw that the
Americans were certain in the end to fight rather than to lose the only
outlet for the commerce of the West. [Footnote: Gayarre, III., 576. The
King of Spain, at the instigation of Godoy, disapproved the order of
Morales, but so late that the news of the disapproval reached Louisiana
only as the French were about to take possession. However, the reversal
of the order rendered the course of the further negotiations easier.] It
seems probable that the Intendant's action was due to the fact that he
deemed the days of Spanish dominion numbered, and, in his jealousy of
the Americans, wished to place the new French authorities in the
strongest possible position; but the act was not done with the knowledge
of France.

Anger of the Westerners.

Of this, however, the Westerners were ignorant. They felt sure that any
alteration in policy so fatal to their interests must be merely a
foreshadowing of the course the French intended thereafter to follow.
They believed that their wo