Brooks: Diplomacy and the Borderlaeds


ance between England and Spain arranged in the treaty of 1814
(rendered ineffective, however, by the Russo-Spanish concord).
 That Castlereagh's warning to Adams was less menacing than
the Spaniard reported it to be, is seen in a letter of the British for-
eign minister to Wellesley:
Spain cannot be too Cautions in avoiding by every possible Means a Quarrel
with that Power [the United States], and don't let her falsely calculate upon
Embarking Great Britain in her Cause. ... I make this remark the rather,
because, I observed in the Note presented in Oet' by Fernan Nunes, but which
was prepared at Madrid, an asertion that we Had pledged ourselves to resist
by War any Eneroachment on the part of Amers in the Dominions of Spain,
not being conseionu of any such Declaration, I asked Fernan Nune to what
this referred, and found as I supposed that it was attempted most inaccurately
to be built upon a Conidential Conversation of mine with Mr Adams, the
American Minister in London, in which in reply to a question front Him as
to the Rumour of our being in Treaty with Spain for the Purchase of Certain
of her American Territories, I disclaimed any views of Settlement or Aggran-
disement in that Quarter, stating that I could Venture to assure Him that
such would be our firm policy, so long as the United States observed the like
principle, but that is the Sent which I deprecated, sad which he altogether
dislaim'd of attempts on their part at Extention, that it would then become
a New Question for Gt. Britain to consider, what course it became Her to
adopt."
 Adams' account to Monroe corroborates Lord Castlereagh's re-
port of the conversation (which was held on January 25, 1816),
though in somewhat less sedate terms. Castlereagh had told him,
according to Adams:
If it is supposed that we hae a any little triekish policy of thrusting ourselves
in there between you and Spain, we are very much misunderstood indeed. Yon
shall find nothing little or shabby in our policy. ... There is not a spot of
ground on the globe that I would annex to our territories, if it were offered
to us tomorrow.... Do you only observe the same moderation. If we shall ind
you hereafter pursuing a system of encroachment upon your neighbors, what
we might do defesriwey is another consideration."

 Still another basis for alleging that England was obliged to as-
sist Spain was given in a note written by the Spanish charge in
London, Campuzano, to Castlereagh in August, 1817. Campuzano
stated that the Floridas had been guaranteed to His Catholic
Majesty by England in the treaty of 1783, when the latter Power
returned them to Spain after twenty years' domination, and that
that stipulation still held."