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commented. 18 Jefferson, too, doubted the wisdom of the ultimatum. He confided to a friend: “Although we demand of England what is merely of right, reparation for the past, security for the future, yet as their pride will possibly, nay probably, prevent their yielding them to the extent we shall require.” 19 The only recourse when the British refused his demands would be war. More administration meetings followed through July in rooms so scorching hot that clarity of thought was almost impossible. Gallatin’s plans to attack Canada were reviewed in detail and his plans for funding the war discussed.
    All this time, nearly three weeks, the dispatch to Monroe rested on Madison’s desk as if there was no urgency in sending it. Finally Madison passed it to a courier, who boarded the USS
Revenge
on July 28 for the cross-Atlantic journey. Four days later, with nothing decided about how to, when to, or even whether to declare war if the demands were not met, Jefferson fled the steam bath of the capital for his beloved plantation, Monticello. Decisions about how to prepare for war could, it seemed, be left to the cooler days of fall.
    Three days before
Revenge
sailed, the British secretary for foreign affairs, George Canning, had told Monroe the basic facts of the
Leopard
and
Chesapeake
incident. Shocked by the affair, Canning expressed regret and assured the American minister that if British officers were found in the wrong, his government would offer a “most prompt and effectual reparation.” Thinking Canning’s comments a sign of weakness, Monroe demanded that Britain admit the incident had been an attempt“to assert and enforce the unfounded and most unjustifiable pretension to search for deserters.” The British government must, he said, immediately renounce the principle that the Royal Navy had used to justify the search and agree to punish the officers responsible. 20
    Although not yet having received Madison’s instructions to tie the
Chesapeake
incident inextricably to the issue of impressment, Monroe had seized on precisely the same strategy. Irritated by Monroe’s strident language, Canning snapped back that Great Britain would make reparations only when all the facts were known. Somewhat more calmly he assured the American that His Majesty’s government did not assume any right to search ships of war for deserters. If an investigation revealed that this had in fact taken place, Great Britain would disavow the act and discipline the responsible officers.
    Word of Jefferson’s proclamation barring British ships from American ports reached Britain well before
Revenge
brought Monroe his instructions. A powerful lobby of ship owners, Royal Navy officers, East and West India Company merchants, and leading politicians clamoured for immediate declaration of war on the United States. The president’s actions, Canning advised Monroe, “without requiring or waiting for any explanation” were unwarranted and dangerous. 21
    There matters lay until Monroe, now with Madison’s terms in hand, sent Canning a note on September 7. America demanded by way of reparations that Britain restore the seamen taken, punish the officer who ordered the attack, abandon all impressment from merchant vessels, and send a special mission to Washington to announce its compliance with these demands. Knowing Britain would not readily accept tying impressment to the
Chesapeake
incident, Monroe argued that whether the act was carried out on a ship of war or a merchant ship was irrelevant. The simple fact was that impressment, in either case, was a violation of the individual rights of seamen and that a citizen of America was justly entitled to his country’s protection from it. 22
    Canning fired back that the
Chesapeake
incident and the matter of impressment from merchant vessels were “wholly unconnected.” Impressment was a right exercised by Great Britain since it first built a