Adams, speaking of the possible sailing of
the ships, made a remark destined to become famous: "It would be
superfluous in me to point out to your lordship that this is
war." At jest, the authorities were satisfied. The ships were
seized and in the end bought for the British Navy.
Again Napoleon stood alone. Not only had he failed to obtain aid
from abroad, but in France itself his Mexican schemes were widely
and bitterly condemned. Yet he had gone too far to recede, and
what he had been aiming at all along was now revealed. An
assembly of Mexican notables, convened by the general of the
invaders, voted to set up an imperial government and offered the
crown to Napoleon's nominee, the Archduke Maximilian of Austria.
And now the Government at Washington was faced with a complicated
problem. What about the Monroe Doctrine? Did the Union dare
risk war with France? Did it dare pass over without protest the
establishment of monarchy on American soil by foreign arms?
Between these horns of a dilemma, the Government maintained its
precarious position during another year. Seward's correspondence
with Paris was a masterpiece of evasion. He neither protested
against the intervention of Napoleon nor acknowledged the
authority of Maximilian.
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