Expostulations to this effect were at once addressed by the American government to that of the United Kingdom, and an elaborate correspondence was carried on through the years 1854–1856, between Mr. Buchanan, American minister in London, and Lord Clarendon, on the subject, but without any satisfactory result. The United Kingdom hastily augmented her naval forces on the West India station, and her example was promptly followed by the United States; and, for a time, the peace of the two countries hung upon the discretion of a few naval commanders, acting under orders necessarily vague and indefinite.