296 



colonists by saying, that "T1)0 commanders of these vessels wi3 be 

 cautioned to take care that, while supporting the rights of British sub- 

 jects, they do not themselves overstep the bounds of the treaty." 



Lord Aberdeen, April, 1S44, in a letter to Mr. Everett, adopts the 

 0})inion of the crown law^-ers. This, I suppose, was the first unquali- 

 fied official avowal to a functionary of our government of the head- 

 land construction of the convention. His lordship, in March, 1845, 

 in another communication addressed to Mr. Everett, reaffirms this 

 construction, and distinctly states that with reference ta the Bay of 

 Fundy and the other bays on the British American coasts, "no United 

 Stales fisherman has, under that convention, the right to fish within 

 three miles of the entrance of such bays as designated by a line drawn 

 from headland to headland at that entrance." 



Our right, therefore, to the bays in dispute rests upon the British 

 interpretation of the treaty, as well as our own. 



Nor are w^e unsupported by colonists. Some, with great fairness, 

 admit all that we claim. Two examples will suffice. A respectable 

 colonial newspaper, in commenting, in 1845, upon Lord Stanley's des- 

 patch of March 30, of that year, which, it will be remembered, opens 

 the Ba}' of Fundy, objects to the measure on the ground that our privi- 

 leges were already ample : for, it remarks, " in tlie convention of 1818, 

 It is stipulated that the citizens of the United States shall be allowed to 

 fish within three nautical miles around all our coasts;" that instrument, 

 it argues, " should have resei-vcd to us [to British subjects] the quiet and 

 undisturbed possession of our bays and inlets.''^ The article from which 

 this extract is made is able, and was copied into several other colonial 

 newspapers.* 



* Some of the colonial newspapers still maintain similar views. The St. John New Bnms- 

 wicker said, in August, 1852, in commentin/r on Mr. W'ebster's despatch or "proclamation," 

 that " it will be seen that Mr. Webster labors under the impression that her Majesty's govern- 

 ment are about to enforce the conventicni strictly, according to the opinions of the law officers 

 of England. We believe tliat such is not the case. For some years past there has been a tacit 

 understanding^ that American Jisliing vessels shouid onfif he excluded from those bays or inhts 

 of our coasts irhich tcere less than sir miles wide, and within which American vessels conld not 

 fish unless within three miles of the land, either on the one side or the other. There is not 

 the slii^litest necessity for straining tlie terms of the convention, for it is notorions that 

 American fishing vessels pursue everywhere near the shores of these provinces, within three 

 miles of tile land, Avhere only in the autumn they get the best fishing; and it is to prevent this 

 flagrant and acknowledged Ineach of the convention that the present movements are taking 

 place." 



The St. John News, in the same month, disavowed the »eic construction of the conventioo 

 in these words: 



" Now all this tempest in a tea-pot amounts to just nothing at all, and wo think the American 

 pres-3 will find o>it before a very gr«>at while that they have been wasting their ])owder, and 

 getting nothing in leturn but pity for their ignorance. They will learn that the legislatures of 

 these provinces have not attempted to give a new reading to the treaty — neither has England; 

 that they do not retiise to Amci icini fishermen the privilege of taking lish in the Bay of Fundy ; 

 whether right or wrong, is another tiling. 



"All that we intend to do is nothing more nor less than we have been doing for the last 

 thirty years — and that is, to seize vessels caught within three miles of the shore, taking fish 

 contrary to the treaty, as thoroughly understood both l)y t'^ngland and America, and also by the 

 6shennen themselves. W'henever it can bo shown that an American vessel has btH.'n taken 

 outside of tlxe prescribed limits, then it will be time enough for our neighbors to get in a 

 pucker." 



A newspaper published at Charlottetown, Prince Edward I.sland, (also in August, 1852,) in 

 an article in answer to the question " Is war probable?" advocates the policy of permitting the 

 Americans to have access to the colonial shores, and remarks : " But a very pretty quarrel 

 with America is by no means improbable, if our cruisers insist on capturing ail Yankee fishing 



