APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 265 



witli tlie inliabitaiits of the coast, must not be understood as giving 

 tliem a riglit to approach the coast of Eastern Siberia, and the Aleutian 

 and Kuriie Islands, which had long been recognized by the other Powers 

 as being under the exclusive dominion of Eussia, and that that pro- 

 vision only applied to the disputed territory on the north-west coast of 

 America, between 54° 40' and 57°. 



In consequence of this declaration, the Head of the Foreign Office 

 and the Commission were of oi>inion that, in order to safeguard the 

 rightsof the Company, and to obviate the possibility of the Convention 

 being wrongly interpreted, the Eussian Minister to the United States 

 should be instructed to make a formal explanatory declaration on the 

 occasion of the exchange of the ratifications of the Convention. The 

 Minister reported that he did not see his way to carrying out these 

 instructions, and that the only way in which he could explain the pro- 

 vision in question to the Washington Cabinet was by a verbal note; he 

 added that a formal declaration might give rise to serious disputes, 

 prevent the ratification of the Convention, and produce an effect which 

 was not intended, by arousing suspicions which would otherwise never 

 be entertained. The Convention was accordingly ratified. 



******* 



[At the end of the ten years' period the American Government asked 

 for a renewal of the i^rivileges ; the Eussian Governinent refused, stating 

 that such a renewal would not be in the interest of the Russian-Ameri- 

 can Company. The American Government then inquired what steps 

 the Eussian Government proposed to take, and were informed that the 

 authorities of the Eussian Colonies had been instructed to jire- 

 40 vent American vessels from visiting the inland seas, gulfs, har- 

 bours, and bays to the north of 54° 40' north latitude.]* 



Extracts from the "Historical Review of the Formation or the Russian- 

 American Company, and their Proceedings up to thk I'rksent Time" 

 (in Russian), by P. Tikhmenieff, St. Petersburgh, 1863, Part II, Pages 

 130-139. 



[Translation.] 



In 1842 Etolin, Governor of the Colony, informed the Company that 

 in the course of his tour of inspection he had come across several Ameri- 

 can ships. Although circumstances had prevented his communicating 

 with them at the time, he had reason to believe that they were whalers. 

 In corroooration of this he stated that for some time he had been con- 

 stantly receiving reports from various parts of the Colony of the appear- 

 ance of American whalers in the neighbourhood of the harbours and 

 shores of the Colony. 



Amongst these reports the most noteworthy was that of Captain 

 Kadnikoff, the commander of the Company's ship "Nasliednik Alexan- 

 der," who stated that, on a voyage from Sitka to Okhotsk, he had hailed 

 a whaler flying the American flag. The master informed him that he 

 had come from the Sandwich Islands in company with thirty other 

 ships to whale on both sides of the western extremity of the Peninsula 

 of Alaska and the eastern islands of the Aleutian group belonging to 

 that peninsula, and that as many as 200 whalers were coming from the 

 United States the same year. Captain Kadnikoff also ascertained from 

 the master that in 1841 he had whaled in the same waters in company 

 with fifty other ships, and that his ship secured thirteen whales, from 

 which 1,600 barrels of oil were obtained. 



*Tlie passages in brackets are abstracts of the Russian text. 



