tions positively forbade him
to yield the navigation of the Mississippi, or to allow the
rectification of the boundary lines as claimed by the United States;
[Footnote: Gardoqui MSS., Instructions, July 25 and October 2, 1784.]
while the representatives of the latter refused to treat at all unless
both of these points were conceded. [Footnote: _Do_., Gardoqui's
Letters, June 19, 1786, October 28, 1786, December 5, 1787, July 25,
1788, etc.] Jay he found to be particularly intractable, and in one of
his letters he expressed the hope that he would be replaced by Richard
Henry Lee, whom Gardoqui considered to be in the Spanish interest. He
was much interested in the case of Vermont, [Footnote: _Do_., May II,
1787.] which at that time was in doubt whether to remain an independent
State, to join the Union, or even possibly to form some kind of alliance
with the British; and what he saw occurring in this New England State
made him for the moment hopeful about the result of the Spanish designs
on Kentucky.

Gardoqui was an over-hopeful man, accustomed to that diplomacy which
acts on the supposition that every one has his price. After the manner
of his kind, he was prone to ascribe absurdly evil motives to all men,
and to be duped himself in consequence. [Footnote: John Mason Brown,
"Political Beginnings of Kentucky," 138.] He never understood the people
with whom he was dealing. He was sure that they could all be reached by
underhand and corrupt influences of some kind, if he could only find out
where to put on the pressure. The perfect freedom with which many loyal
men talked to and before him puzzled him; and their characteristicly
American habit of indulging in gloomy forebodings as to the nation's
future--when they were not insisting that the said future would be one
of unparalleled magnificence--gave him wild hopes that it might prove
possible to corrupt them. He was confirmed in his belief by the
undoubted corruption and disloyalty to their country, shown by a few of
the men he met, the most important of those who were in his pay being an
alleged Catholic, James White, once a North Carolina delegate and
afterwards Indian agent. Moreover others who never indulged in overt
disloyalty to the Union undoubtedly consulted and questioned Gardoqui
about his proposals, while reserving their own decision; being men who
let their loyalty be determined by events. Finally some men of entire
purity committed grave indiscretions in de