general line of the mainland is possible, subject only to the breaks caused by inlets and river valleys, which breaks are comparatively short compared with the lengths of the continuous lines of the monutain summits."

The decision of the Tribunal, on this point, is adverse to the contention of the United States; it acknowledges that the Treaty does not call for a continuous chain of mountains, and that those mountains which exist along the coast, answer the requirements of the Treaty for the tracing of the line-frontier. || I entirely concur in the foregoing part of the decision of the Tribunal on this question, but I stop there, and cannot follow the majority in the adoption of its system for the demarcation of the line. || The Treaty of 1825 clearly indicates, in my opinion, that the mountains which were to constitute the boundary-line, were those nearest to the coast. In fact, when the Treaty says: „,the summit of the mountains situate parallel to the coast," it evidently points to the mountains on the coast, those which are situated on the border of the coast, and if we were to suppose two chains of mountains, one parallel to the other, the one which would lie the farthest from the coast would not be situated parallel to the coast, but it would be situated parallel to the other chain of mountains. Therefore, the first range of mountains, the one nearest to the coast, is the one which is alone indicated by the Treaty. This, to me, seems unanswerable. || But a few quotations from the opinions of those who have negotiated this Treaty, will render the point still more evident. || Mr. George Canning, in a despatch to Sir Charles Bagot, dated the 12th July, 1824, says: - ,,His Majesty's Government have resolved to authorize your Excellency to consent to include the south points of Prince of Wales Island within the Russian frontiers, and to take as the line of demarcation a line drawn from the southernmost point of Prince of Wales Island from south to north through Portland Channel, till it strikes the mainland in latitude 56, thence following the sinuosities of the coast, along the base of the mountains nearest the sea to Mount Elias

Count Lieven, in a Memorandum which he prepared on the Northwest Coast Convention (24th July, 1824), says: „In the case now under consideration, the word base, by the indefinite meaning which it presents, and the greater or less extension which can be given to it, would appear hardly suitable to secure the delimitation against subsequent disputes, for it would not be impossible, in view of the little exactness of the geographical ideas which we as yet possess as to these regions, that the mountains designated as the boundary should extend, by an insensible slope, down to the very border of the coast."

In his despatch to Count Lieven, bearing date the 20th February, 1825, Count Nesselrode again mentions the natural frontier formed by the mountains bordering on the coast." || There is, therefore, no doubt in my mind that the mountains indicated by the Treaty are those situated nearest to the coast. || Nevertheless, instead of following the evident meaning of the Treaty, the majority of the Tribunal has adopted a line which, at a number of points of its course, rests on mountains which lie far from the coast, and are separated from it by nearer ones, which ought consequently to have been chosen in their stead, as the points of demarcation of the line. || I found it impossible, under such circumstances, to concur in this arbitrary determination of a line which, although it does not concede all the territory they claimed to the United States, nevertheless deprives Canada of the greater part of that to which she was entitled. L. A. Jetté.

Nr. 13232. VEREINIGTE STAATEN. - Meinung der amerikanischen Bevollmächtigten.

Opinion on Second Question.

October 20, 1903.

Question number two of the Convention, ,,What is the Portland Channel?" has presented such peculiar difficulties that the Undersigned feel it necessary to set forth the reasons which have led them to join in the decision rendered by a majority of the Tribunal. || An inlet of great depth, starting just below the 56th parallel, runs down to the head of Pearse Island. At this point the inlet divides, and down to this point of division there is no question of identity and none has ever been seriously raised. From the north-eastern corner of Pearse Island to within five miles of the 56th parallel the identity of this inlet with the Portland Channel, as intended by the negotiators of the Treaty of 1825, is undisputed, but after the division at Pearse Island the question has arisen whether the channel south of Pearse and Wales Islands is the Portland Channel, or whether that which passes to the north of those two islands is entitled to the name. Were we able to rest a decision solely on maps which we know to have been before the negotiators of the Treaty of 1825, the weight of evidence in the opinion of the Undersigned would be in favour of the view that the Portland Channel passed south of Wales and Pearse Islands, with Observatory Inlet entering it on the other side, and so on to the sea. The northern channel as indicated on contemporary maps is narrow and indistinct, so that it is not

easy to believe that any negotiators would have taken it as a clear, well-defined, natural boundary, such as they were seeking to establish in the Treaty of Delimitation. The testimony of maps subsequent to the Treaty is fluctuating, but general opinion seems to have settled down to the belief that the more obvious southern channel was a continuation and part of the Portland Channel, and on many of the later maps we find the channel passing south of Pearse and Wales Islands denominated „Portland Inlet". In determining, however, what should now be called Portland Channel, the question to be decided was that the negotiators meant when they used that term, and in arriving at the intention of the negotiators of the Treaty of 1725, it was not possible to reach it by an inspection of the maps alone. The negotiators undoubtedly intended when they named Portland Channel as the southern boundary of the Russian possessions to refer to that inlet or body of water which Vancouver named Portland Canal, for it was Vancouver who gave the name, as is well known, to this inlet. If Vancouver had left us nothing but maps the Case, although not free from doubt and obscurity, would be comparatively simple. But Vancouver also published in addition to his maps a detailed narrative of all his explorations upon the north-western coast of America. || It was argued very forcibly by the Counsel for the United States that there was no proof that the negotiators had read Vancouver's narrative, but while it is no doubt true that they made no such examination of that narrative as has lately been pursued, it is almost impossible to suppose that men of trained ability seeking to establish a natural boundary in a little-known region should not have read the only book which contained any detailed information as to that portion of the globe with which they were dealing. We know from undoubted evidence that Mr. Pelly, the representative of Hudson Bay Company, who was consulted by Mr. Canning at every stage of the negotiations, had read Vancouver's narrative, or, at least, those portions relating to the part of the coast which was under discussion. It is almost incredible, therefore, that Mr. Canning and Sir Charles Bagot should not also have examined the narrative, and it is equally unlikely that the Russians should have failed to consult the one book which contained a detailed examination of that region, and which had appeared in no less than four editions, two in English and two in French. || It has seemed, therefore, to the Undersigned impossible to exclude the narrative in endeavouring to reach a conclusion as to what the negotiators meant by the Portland Channel. In 1888 Mr. Dall, of the Smithsonian Institution, in a Memorandum sent to Mr. Bayard, said (pp. 104 and 105, United States

Counter-Case):

At this point we come across another difficulty, or, rather, one has been suggested very recently. By a careful study of Vancouver's text it is evident that there is on this point a certain discrepancy between his charts and his text. In reading over his whole account of the survey of this inlet and its branches (Vancouver, official English edition, vol. ii, pp. 329, 330, 331, 334-340, and 371), he seems to have varied a little in his notions, but his final treatment of Observatory Inlet extends it to Points Wales and Maskelyne, while in another place he seems to regard it as beginning at Point Ramsden (cf. op. cit. 2, p. 375). On the other hand, he treats Portland Inlet as continuing to the sea behind Wales and Pearse Islands. So that, if the Treaty is to be tried by Vancouver's text, it will result in giving to Great Britain the abovementioned islands and some other small ones."

Mr. Dall there points out for the first time the discrepancy which appeared to exist between the maps and the text of the narrative, or, perhaps, to state it more exactly, the discrepancy between the text and what appeared to be the obvious, though not necessarily the only, meaning of the maps. There is no need here to enter into all the details. of Vancouver's narrative, but on page 379 of his narrative he says, under the date of Monday, the 19th August, 1793: ||,,A want of wind and a flood tide prevented our weighing until nine the following morning, when with an ebb tide we again proceeded, but did not reach the entrance to Observatory Inlet until two of the morning of the 20th, a distance of not more than thirteen leagues from Salmon Cove. The western point of Observatory Inlet I distinguished by calling it Point Wales." || That is, he called that stretch of water from Salmon Cove, on Observatory Inlet, where his ships had been anchored, to the south-western extremity of Wales Island, a distance of 13 leagues, „Observatory Inlet." This includes, as a glance at the map will show, the channel which passes south of Pearse and Wales Islands. If, therefore, he intended to name that whole stretch of water Observatory Inlet, it is exclusive, and the name of Portland Canal cannot be applied to it. Portland Canal, therefore, must either have stopped at the north-eastern extremity of Pearse Island or must have continued by the channel north of that island to the eastern end of Wales Island. || The question is a very close one, but if we admit the text of the narrative it seems difficult to avoid the conclusion that by „Observatory Inlet" he included all the water from Salmon Cove to the south-western extremity of Wales Island. We also know that he explored the northern channel, occupying himself in that work from the 27th July to the 2nd August. He followed the channel

westerly, passing what has been known as Tongass Passage, between Wales and Sitklan Islands, through which he looked and saw at a short distance the ocean. Desiring, however, to find, if possible, another opening to the ocean which followed the general line of the Continent, he kept on through the narrow passage which passes north of Sitklan and Kannaghunut Islands, and came out into the ocean opposite Cape Fox. Near Cape Fox he encamped. He then explored the waters around Revilla Gigedo Island, and on the 14th August returned to Cape Fox. At dawn the next morning, which in that latitude and in August must have been at a very early hour, he set out to return to his vessels, and he writes that in the forenoon, which must have been some hours after he started from the point opposite the narrow channel out of which he had issued the 2nd August, he passed the mouth of the channel which he had previously explored, and which he named ,,Portland's Canal, in honour of the noble family of Bentinck." || His exact language is as follows: 11 ,,In the forenoon we reached that arm of the sea whose examination had occupied our time from the 27th of the preceding to the 2nd of this month. The distance from its entrance to its source is about 70 miles, which, in honour of the noble family of Bentinck, I named ,Portland's Canal" (pp. 370-71, Vancouver). || It seems clear from this statement that if he considered, as the other extracts from his narrative already cited seem to prove, the northerly channel as the natural extension of the deep inlet running to the 56th parallel, he must have looked into it through Tongass Passage, and then and there gave it its name. Moreover, it is quite obvious from the maps that there are three outlets for the waters which come through the northern channel and are swelled by those from the inlets about Fillmore Island. Two of them are very small, so small as to be practically impossible to navigate. The third is the Tongass Passage, and that seems beyond a question, on the face of both the maps and the text, to be the true entrance to the channel which passes north of Wales and Pearse Islands. Accepting Vancouver's narrative as having the greatest weight, the conclusion follows that the award of the Tribunal must be that the Portland Channel intended by the makers of the Treaty of 1825 was that body of water which entered the sea by the Tongass Passage and passed thence north of Wales and Pearse Islands, and so onward to the immediate neighbourhood of the 56th parallel.

Elihu Root.

Henry Cabot Lodge.
George Turner.