Mr.Webster never appeared to better advantage, and he never made a more manly speech than on this occasion, when, without any bravado, he quietly set the influence and the threats of his party at defiance.
He was not mistaken in thinking that the treaty was not yet in smooth water.

It was again attacked in the Senate, and it had a still more severe ordeal to go through in Parliament.

The opposition, headed by Lord Palmerston, assailed the treaty and Lord Ashburton himself, with the greatest virulence, denouncing the one as a capitulation, and the other as a grossly unfit appointment.

Moreover, the language of the President's message led England to believe that we claimed that the right of search had been abandoned.

After much correspondence, this misunderstanding drew forth an able letter from Mr.Webster, stating that the right of search had not been included in the treaty, but that the "cruising convention" had rendered the question unimportant.