Upon Mr.Adams fell some consequences of previous American crudities, of which I shall speak later.
Lincoln had declared a blockade on Southern ports before Mr.Adams arrived in London.

Upon his arrival he found England had proclaimed her neutrality and recognized the belligerency of the South.

This dismayed Mr.Adams and excited the whole North, because feeling ran too high to perceive this first act on England's part to be really favorable to us; she could not recognize our blockade, which stopped her getting Southern cotton, unless she recognized that the South was in a state of war with us.

Looked at quietly, this act of England's helped us and hurt herself, for it deprived her of cotton.
It was not with this, but with the reception and treatment of Mr.Adams that the true hostility began.

Slights to him were slaps at us, sympathy with the South was an active moral injury to our cause, even if it was mostly an undertone, politically.