Two of the secretaries started from Ghent on a continental tour, and notice was given to the landlord of the house where the commissioners resided of their intention to quit it on October 1.

On August 2, while matters were still at this deadlock, Lord Castlereagh passed through Ghent on his way to the Congress at Vienna.

Goulburn was ordered to change his tone and Lord Liverpool was advised to moderate his demands; to use Castlereagh's words, to "a letting down of the question." Lord Liverpool replied on September 2, that he had already given Goulburn to understand that the commission had taken a very erroneous view of British policy.

In this communication he betrays the hope, which the cabinet had entertained, of the outcome of American dissensions, by his expression of the opinion that if the negotiation had broken off on the notes already presented by the British commission, or the answer that the Americans were disposed to make, the war would have become popular in America.
Lord Bathurst reopened the negotiations, but his modification was of tone rather than of matter.

The surrender of the control of the Lakes to Great Britain, and of the Northwest Territory to the Indians, was still adhered to.