[Sidenote: Debts.]
[Sidenote: Slaves.]
[Sidenote: Treaty signed.]

The main difficulties disposed of, three troublesome minor points had to
be adjusted. The first was the question of loyalists. They had suffered
from their attachment to the British government; they had been exiled;
their estates had been confiscated, their names made a by-word. The
British government first insisted, and then pleaded, that the treaty
should protect these persons if they chose to return to their former
homes. The Americans would agree only that Congress should "earnestly
recommend" to the thirteen legislatures to pass Relief Acts. Then came the
question of private debts due to the British merchants at the outbreak of
the Revolution, and still unpaid. Some of the American envoys objected to
reviving these obligations; but Adams, when he arrived, set the matter at
rest by declaring that he had "no notion of cheating anybody." Finally
came the question of the treatment of the slaves who had taken refuge with
the British armies; and the English commissioners agreed that the British
troops should withdraw "without causing any destruction or the carrying
away any negroes or other property of the American inhabitants." On Nov.
30, 1782, a provisional treaty was signed; but it was not until Sept. 3,
1783 after the peace between France and England had been adjusted, that
the definitive treaty was signed, in precisely the same terms.

With great difficulty a quorum was assembled, and on Jan. 14, 1784, it was
duly ratified by Congress. The treaty was a triumph for American
diplomacy. "It is impossible," says Lecky, the ablest historian of this
period, "not to be struck with the skill, hardihood, and good fortune that
marked the American negotiations. Everything the United States could with
any show of plausibility demand from England, they obtained."