riot. following the celebration of those treaties, and clear evidence of this is furnished by the case of Case of the Lo- the Loriot, cited at pp. 79 to 83 of the British Case. Deeming this incident only indirectly relevant to the question of right in and about Bering Sea, the United States dismissed it in their Case with a very brief mention; but the importance given it by the British Government now requires a more complete statement of the facts and issues involved. The treaty of 1824 granted for a term of ten years certain trading privileges upon the coast between Yakutat Bay and latitude 54° 40′ north.2 On May 19, 1835, the United States were notified by the Russian Minister that the privileges had come to an end and that the captains of two American vessels at Sitka had been requested to take notice of this fact. The United States thereinitiated strenuous efforts to obtain a renewal of the privileges in question, and while doing so news was received of the seizure by the Russians of the Loriot, an American vessel, for trading upon the Northwest Coast, in latitude 54° 55' north, i. e., just above the southernmost limit referred to in the treaty of 1824. upon 1 Case of the United States, p. 59. 2 Case of the United States, p. 58. riot. Vigorous protests followed on the part of the Case of the LoUnited States and compensation was demanded, the protests being used to strengthen the claim already put forward for a renewal of the ten years' privileges. A summary of the diplomatic correspondence will be found in the Appendix hereto.1 It is sufficient to say here that the Russian Government was so obdurate in its refusal to recede from its position, that the United States Government was eventually compelled to recognize the correctness of the same and to completely abandon its claim. In so far, then, as the Loriot case has any bearing upon the questions here involved, it shows that the United States Government recognized and acquiesced in the colonial system which Russia maintained, even to the south of Sitka. the British Case. Chapter IV of the British Case treats of the waters Chapter IV of of Bering Sea and the Pacific Ocean adjacent to the Northwest Coast during the period following the treaties. Some of the vessels referred to as having made voyages to those regions visited the Northwest Coast only where, it is to be remembered, for ten years after the treaties trade was carried on by American and British citizens with the express consent of the Russian Government. After 1835, however, most of the voyages that extended Post, p. 180-184. may not Chapter IV of to the coast north of latitude 54° 40′ were in the British Case. violation of Russian law. All violations have been punished, but that the law was none the less in force is shown by the seizure of the Loriot, by the proclamation of the United States Government in 1845,' and by the proclamation of the Russian Government in 1864.2 Visits of whalers to Bering Sea. Later, however, especially in the years following 1840, Bering Sea was actually visited, as pointed out at pp. 83 to 90 of the British Case, by numerous vessels, mostly whalers. But it is shown by Bancroft, the author so frequently quoted by the British Government, that the whaling industry was not, for the Russians, a profitable one, and there appears to have been no motive for protecting that industry by the imperial ukase or the regulations of the colonial government. Bancroft is also referred to in the British Case (pp. 83 and 84) to show that in 1842 the Russian Government refused Etholin's request that Bering Sea be protected against invasions of foreign whalers, on the ground that the treaty of 1824 between Russia and the United States gave to American citizens the right to engage in fishing over the whole extent of the Pacific Ocean.1 From what is said, however, by this same author immediately following the above citation, it appears that, through the endeavors of Etholen, "the Government at length referred the matter to a committee composed of officials of the navy department, who reported that the cost of fitting out a cruiser for the protection of Bering Sea against foreign whalers would be 200,000 roubles in silver and the cost of maintaining such a craft 85,000 roubles a year. To this a recommendation was added that, if the company were willing to assume the expenditure, a cruiser should at once be placed at their disposal." Hence, according to Bancroft, the failure to protect Bering Sea can not be traced to the fact that the Russian Government considered it had lost the right to do so by the treaties of 1824 and 1825. Visits of whal ers to Bering Sea. seals not relin The position of the United States does not, Right to protect however, depend on the foregoing explanation quished. being the true one. Why Russia claimed to guard her coasts for a distance of 100 miles has already been pointed out; and from the fact that, for whatever reason, she may have suffered the carrying on of whaling or of any sort of fishing in Bering Sea, it does not follow that she relin 1 Bancroft's Alaska, p. 583. quished her clear right to protect her seal herds on their way to and from their breeding grounds. Evidence of Even as to the whalers this much is certain: surveillance over Bering Sea. their movements were, after the year 1850, or thereabouts, closely watched; and in support of this, and of the broader proposition that a general surveillance was exercised over the colonial seas, the following evidence is offered. ex It appears that in 1849 foreign whalers visited the Pribilof Islands. This evoked from the board of administration of the Russian American Company a letter to the chief manager, dated July 13, 1850, in which it is said: "At the same time the board of administration pects that you, like your predecessor, have taken all necessary measures for guarding the Pribilof Islands, which are of such importance to the Company, from a repetition of similar attempts on the part of foreigners. In future, and until the clearing of those waters from whalers by means of a cruiser, of whose sending the board has already received information, you are directed to order the Company's cruisers to pay particular attention to the Pribilof Islands."1 On the 18th of April, 1852, the board of administration again wrote the chief manager concerning the visits of foreign whalers, and stated that Post, p. 199. |