Florida, but was not in any alliance with the United States. The
French government, tied thus to two allies, recognized the possible
contingency of diverging interests between Spain and the United States,
and exerted all the influence it could to keep diplomatic control in
its own hands. This it accomplished through its representatives in
America, especially de la Luzerne, who wielded an immense prestige with
the members of the Continental Congress, not only through his position
as representative of the power whose military, naval, and financial aid
was absolutely indispensable, but also by means of personal intrigues
of a type hitherto more familiar in European courts than in simple
America. Under his direction, Congress authorized its European
representatives, Franklin, Jay, and Adams, accredited to France, Spain,
and the Netherlands respectively, to act as peace commissioners and to
be guided in all things by the advice and consent of the French
Minister, {119} Vergennes. Their instructions designated boundaries,
indemnity for ravages and for the taking of slaves, and a possible
cession of Canada, but all were made subject to French approval. When,
accordingly, in 1781, both Shelburne and Fox of the Rockingham Ministry
sought to open negotiations with the American representatives, while
pushing on vigorously the war against France and Spain, they
interjected an embarrassing element into the situation. Vergennes
could not prohibit American negotiation, but he relied upon the
instructions of the commissioners to enable him to prevent the making
of any separate peace, contrary to the treaty of 1778.

The first steps were taken by Franklin and Shelburne, who opened
unofficial negotiations through Richard Oswald, a friend of America.
It seems to have been Shelburne's plan to avoid the preliminary
concession of independence, hoping to retain some form of connection
between America and England, or at least to use independence as a
make-weight in the negotiations. Hence Oswald, his agent, was not
commissioned to deal with the United States as such. Fox, Secretary
for Foreign Affairs, felt, on the other hand, that the negotiation
belonged to his field, and he sent Thomas Grenville to Paris,
authorized to deal with France {120} and, indirectly, with the United
States. Over this difference in the Cabinet, and over other matters,
an acute personal rivalry developed between Fox and Shelburne, which
culminated when Rockin