Secondly, not to permit or suffer either belligerent to make use of its ports or waters as the base of naval operations against the other, or for the purpose of the renewal or augmentation of military supplies or arms, or the recruitment of men.

Thirdly, to exercise due diligence in its own ports or waters, and as to all persons within its jurisdiction, to prevent any violation of the foregoing obligations and duties."

Other Articles prescribed the mode in which the Court of Arbitration should deal with the questions referred to them; and provided that each of the contracting parties should send in a statement of its case within six months after the ratification of the Treaty (which took place on the 17th June) and might send in a counter-case within four months thereafter.

Never was Treaty received with stronger expressions of approval and delight by all classes of the community, than was that of Washington in June last everybody looked upon it as a really "amicable settlement" of "differences" which had long interfered with the friendly relations so desirable to be maintained between the two great kindred nationalities which held the lead in the march of modern civilization.

It was the universal cheerful understanding that these unsettled "Alabama Claims " were now really to be got rid of, perhaps for nothing, but at the worst for a moderate payment on account of direct damages, without any pretence for claims, visionary and almost indefinable in nature, under the head of

indirect or consequential damages of any kind. Such was the assurance with which every leading authority in both Houses of Parliament, on the 12th June (with the sole exception of Lord Cairns, who expressed some misgivings on the subject), congratulated the country; and as General Schenck, the United States Minister, was in the gallery of the House of Lords, and heard what was said by the noble Foreign Secretary and others, and did not protest against it, and as the speeches in both Houses were published in the usual way in all the newspapers, and elicited no word of dissent from the government or press on the other side of the Atlantic, it was taken for granted that the agreeable view of the case in which we indulged was assented to. It has even been made a matter of complaint both in Parliament and in the official correspondence from our Foreign Office, now that the "Case" put forward by the United States has dispelled these agreeable anticipations, that the United States acted in bad faith in not disabusing us of our error at the time, with the not very logical conclusion, that in not doing so-in not repudiating the construction our statesmen and political writers put upon the Treaty on the first blush of its provisions-they gave adhesion to, and became bound by them. Mr. Fish, however, in his answer to Lord Granville, rather curtly repudiated this argument. Let us take

a common sense view of the matter. The discussions in Parliament referred to, and relied upon by Lord Granville, took place on the 12th June, and the exchange of the ratifications of the Treaty

:

was fixed to take place on the 17th of the same month does Lord Granville really mean to imply that it was the duty of General Schenck, the United States Minister, to interpose on his own responsibility explanations, or rejoinders, in reference to our Parliamentary utterances, with a view of delaying the ratification of a treaty already diplomatically completed? The idea is most unreasonable; and besides, if acted upon, would, according to the modern theory of diplomacy, have availed nothing; it being held that ratification is a matter of course which cannot be refused by the Sovereign, unless upon the ground that its plenipotentiaries have admitted something into the treaty without instructions, or contrary to instructions. No doubt, the American Government showed great firmness and closeness in keeping their counsel; but they were perfectly at liberty to do so, and their doing so only postponed a discussion which was not to be indefinitely avoided.

it

year,

In the pleasant feeling of complacency in which we had wrapped ourselves, all the summer and autumn, may well be conceived how great was the astonishment, how great the bewilderment, how great the indignation and disgust, when, towards Christmas last the American case made its appearance, being scattered ostentatiously in several languages, amongst all the courts of the old and new world; and when it was found to contain and insist upon every claim for "indirect" as well as "direct" damages that had ever been propounded by the American Government in its most exacting and unfriendly moods. In the first excitement of the moment

Diplomacy cast aside its accustomed reserve, and Ministers adopted what Lord Russell has termed the "grave," and as we consider it, the unconstitutional and unprecedented course, of referring to the matter in a paragraph of the Queen's Speech at the opening of the session of Parliament, where mention is made of claims being advanced "which do not appear to me to come within the reference;" it being added that her Majesty had directed "a friendly communication" to be addressed to the Government of the United States on the subject.

A

Of this proceeding, we repeat that it was most injudicious, as well as contrary to usual practice. It was an announcement from the Throne to the two Houses of Parliament of certain views as to the carrying out of the provisions of a Treaty already agreed upon, and of full operative force,-views diametrically opposed to those just formed by the other party to the Treaty; thus inviting a decision, by authority of the three Estates of the realm, condemnatory of the conduct of that party, being a friendly power. declaration thus solemnly adopted could have but one effect, namely, to render terms of accommodation, involving the slightest concession on either side, impossible; and no "friendly communication," following upon it, could remove or smooth the difficulty thus recklessly conjured up. But in truth, whatever hope there might have been of extracting anything from the generous humour of the government of the United States by this clumsy and humiliating appeal, was, on the very evening when the fact was announced, dashed to the ground by the unfor

tunate temper of the intractable Premier, who, far from imitating the judicious reserve of his noble colleague in the other House, denounced, and that in most violent, dogmatic, and offensive language, the conduct of the United States, and noisily challenged the whole world to dispute his own constructions of the terms of the Treaty, as being "the meaning, the only meaning, the rational meaning, the direct grammatical meaning." All this could only imply that the Government of the United States, supposing it to be gifted with ordinary intelligence, must have been guilty of deliberate dishonesty and attempted extortion, in putting forward pretensions which were subject to be repudiated in such emphatic terms; and it is not to be surprised at that, upou this, if upon no other grounds, that Government has persistently declined, in spite of our reiterated appeals, to withdraw, or modify, one iota of their case, and thereby involve the risk of appearing to plead guilty to Mr. Gladstone's unhandsome imputation.

The long and dreary correspondence which has since taken place between Lord Granville and Mr. Fish has thrown little new light upon the subject. We are sorry to add that neither in matter nor in manner does it redound in any way to the honour of diplomacy as a profession, being at once dogmatic and undignified; dealing throughout in that lowest form of homely contention, known as fending and proving," in the course of which, averments on either side are often demurred to on the other, in a manner which approaches very nearly