[126] The house that Adams bought during this stay in the Netherlands became the first American embassy on foreign soil.[127]

Treaty of Paris
Treaty of Paris by Benjamin West (Adams in front).
After negotiating the loan with the Dutch, Adams was re-appointed as the American commissioner to negotiate the war-ending treaty, the Treaty of Paris. Vergennes and France's minister to the United States, Anne-César de La Luzerne, disapproved of Adams, so Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Jay, and Henry Laurens were appointed to collaborate with Adams, although Jefferson did not initially go to Europe and Laurens was posted to the Dutch Republic following his imprisonment in the Tower of London.[128]
In the final negotiations, securing fishing rights off Newfoundland and Cape Breton Island proved both very important and very difficult. In response to very strict restrictions proposed by the British, Adams insisted that not only should American fishermen be allowed to travel as close to shore as desired, but that they should be allowed to cure their fish on the shores of Newfoundland.[129] This, and other statements, prompted Vergennes to secretly inform the British that France did not feel compelled to "sustain [these] pretentious ambitions."