Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward
Sir: In connection with my despatches Nos. 1430 and 1439,I have the honor now to report that Lord Stanley, the day after returning to the city, granted me an interview which took place on Tuesday last, the 10th instant.
I read to him your despatch No. 2037, and consented to his taking a copy of it. He said that his first impression was that the terms furnished a practicable mode of arriving at some agreement. But it would be necessary for him to consider maturely the language of the fourth and sixth paragraphs, as well as to consult more or less with his colleagues, before he could give a definite answer.
It was clear to him that there must be some limit applied to the field of arbitration, or it would be impossible to find an umpire. But with any proper share of confidence in the selection, it might be perhaps possible to trust the performance of that task to his own judgment.
I remarked that this suggestion certainly seemed to present a practicable way out of the main difficulty.
He then made some general and informal reference to the range of selection of such a power. It seemed desirable to choose from the chief powers of the world. Of these he had thought of four. With regard to one of them, he presumed that late circumstances would not render it agreeable to the United States to think of him. On the other hand, there might be an impression, whether well or ill-founded, he did not say, among his own countrymen, that another would not be in a perfectly impartial frame of mind. Hence there [Page 140] remained the two German powers, either of whom appeared to occupy a sufficiently favorable position.
I replied that I believed our relations with both of them were on so friendly a footing that I saw no obstacle at this moment to our consent to the selection of either.
His lordship ended by saying that he really was now in hopes that the matter might be arranged. He should endeavor not to take a great while in preparing a reply.
I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,
Hon. William. H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.