For this difficult duty he had several good qualifications.

During his embassy at St.Petersburg he had shown a combination of tact and firmness which imposed respect, and doubtless his composure under the violent outbreaks of the Czar Paul furnished a recommendation for the equally trying post at Paris, which he filled with a _sang froid_ that has become historic.

Possibly a more genial personality might have smoothed over some difficulties at the Tuileries: but the Addington Ministry, having tried geniality in the person of Cornwallis, naturally selected a man who was remarkable for his powers of quiet yet firm resistance.
His first instructions of September 10th, 1802, are such as might be drawn up between any two Powers entering on a long term of peace.

But the series of untoward events noticed above overclouded the political horizon; and the change finds significant expression in the secret instructions of November 14th.

He is now charged to state George III.'s determination "never to forego his right of interfering in the affairs of the Continent on any occasion in which the interests of his own dominions or those of Europe in general may appear to him to require it." A French despatch is then quoted, as admitting that, for every considerable gain of France on the Continent, Great Britain had some claim to compensation: and such a claim, it was hinted, might now be proffered after the annexation of Piedmont and Parma.