This menace would not be stilled but augmented if the colonies should be established as a republic.

Such an example might be too readily followed.

Though France had, by a secret treaty in 1762, made over to Spain the province of Louisiana, she was not unmindful of the Bourbon motto, "He who attacks the Crown of one attacks the other." And she saw her chance to deal a crippling blow at England's prestige and commerce.
In 1764, the French Minister, Choiseul, had sent a secret agent, named Pontleroy, to America to assist in making trouble and to watch for any signs that might be turned to the advantage of les duex couronnes.
Evidently Pontleroy's reports were encouraging for, in 1768, Johann Kalb--the same Kalb who fell at Camden in 1780--arrived in Philadelphia to enlarge the good work.

He was not only, like several of the foreign officers in the War of Independence, a spy for his Government, but he was also the special emissary of one Comte de Broglie who, after the colonies had broken with the mother country, was to put himself at the head of American affairs.

This Broglie had been for years one of Louis XV's chief agents in subterranean diplomacy, and it is not to be supposed that he was going to attempt the stupendous task of controlling America's destiny without substantial backing.