the Chickasaws, and got from them a formal cession of the Chickasaw Bluffs, which was a direct blow at the American pretensions.  As with all Indian tribes, the Chickasaws were not capable of any settled policy, and were not under any responsible authority.  While some of them were in close alliance with the Americans and were warring on the Creeks, the others formed a treaty with the Spaniards and gave them the territory they so earnestly wished. [Footnote:  Do., De Lemos to Carondelet, enclosed in Carondelet’s letter of Sept. 26, 1795.]

    Pinckney Sent as Minister to Spain.

However, neither Carondelet’s energy and devotion to the Spanish government nor his unscrupulous intrigues were able for long; to defer the fate which hung over the Spanish possessions.  In 1795 Washington nominated as Minister to Spain Thomas Pinckney, a member of a distinguished family of South Carolina statesmen, and a man of the utmost energy and intelligence.  Pinckney finally wrung from the Spaniards a treaty which was as beneficial to the West as Jay’s treaty, and was attended by none of the drawbacks which marred Jay’s work.  The Spaniards at the outset met his demands by a policy of delay and evasion.  Finally, he determined to stand this no longer, and, on October 24, 1795, demanded his passports, in a letter to Godoy, the “Prince of Peace.”  The demand came at an opportune moment; for Godoy had just heard of Jay’s treaty.  He misunderstood the way in which this was looked at in the United States, and feared lest, if not counteracted, it might throw the Americans into the arms of Great Britain, with which country Spain was on the verge of war.  It is not a little singular that Jay should have thus rendered an involuntary but important additional service to the Westerners who so hated him.

    He Negotiates a treaty.

The Spaniards now promptly came to terms.  They were in no condition to fight the Americans; they knew that war would be the result if the conflicting claims of the two peoples were not at once definitely settled, one way or the other; and they concluded the treaty forthwith. [Footnote:  Pinckney receives justice from Lodge, in his “Washington,” II., 160.  For Pinckney’s life, see the biography by Rev. C. C. Pinckney, p. 129, etc.] Its two most important provisions were the settlement of the southern boundary on the lines claimed by the United States, and the granting of the right of deposit to the Westerners.  The boundary followed the thirty-first degree of latitude from the Mississippi to the Chattahoochee, down it to the Flint, thence to the head of the St. Mary’s, and down it to the ocean.  The Spanish troops were to be withdrawn from this territory within the space of six months.  The Westerners were granted for three years the right of deposit at New Orleans; after three years, either the right was to be continued, or another equivalent port of deposit was to be granted somewhere on the banks of the Mississippi.  The right of deposit carried with it the right to export goods from the place of deposit free from any but an inconsiderable duty. [Footnote:  American State Papers, Foreign Relations, I., p. 533, etc.; Pinckney to Secretary of State, Aug. 11, 1795; to Godoy (Alcudia), Oct. 24, 1795; copy of treaty, Oct. 27th, etc.]