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America, Russia, Hemp, and NapoleonRussian government was busying itself with finding new customersfor Russian products. Alexander's valiant ally, France,was no good as a customer. France was a continental nation,too, and raised for itself man y of the goods Russia exported. 31The goods she did want, and want desperately from Russia,such as masts and spars, were too cumbersome to ship any waybut by sea, and there lay the Britishfleet,eager to utilize everystick of timber it could seize. In 181 o, the French needed mastsso badly that they tried tofloatrafts of masts from Riga alongthe coastal shallows behind the sand bars and low islands toMemel, where they could travel by inland waterways to Hamburgand thence to France. But a storm shattered the rafts andstrewed the masts all over the Baltic. 32 There was simply noway in which France could substitute for England as Russia'schief customer.O n 13 July 1808, Count Rumiantsev, Chancellor of Russia,informed Levett Harris that Russia was sending itsfirstdiplomaticrepresentative to the United States. Tsar Alexander hadappointed Andre Dashkoff the Russian consul-general at Philadelphiaand also conferred on him the office of his charged'affaires near the Congress of the United States. 33 AsRumiantsev said, ". . . In dissolving our commercial connectionswith Great Britain, it became necessary to seek some otherpower in who m w e might find a substitute, and on lookingaround, I could see none but the United States who were at allcompetent to this object." 341. Letter to Secretary of State, 19/31 December 1807, St. Petersburg,National Archives, Consular Dispatches—St. Petersburg, Vol. I.2. Message of the President of the United States, Transmitting List of122