APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 283 



if they are subsisting now. In succeeding to tlie Eussian possessions 

 it docs not follow that the United States succeed to ancient obligations 



assumed by llussia, as if, according to a phrase of the common 

 52 law, they are "covenants running with the land." If these 



stipulations are in the nature of scyritudes they dejiend for their 

 duration on the sovereignty of Eussia, and are ijersonal or national 

 rather than territorial. iSo at least I am inclined to believe. But it is 

 hardly profitable to speculate on a point of so little practical value. 

 Even if "running with the land" these servitudes can be terminated at 

 the expiration of ten years from the last Treaty by a notice, which 

 equitably the United States may give, so as to take effect on the 12th 

 January, 1809. Meanwhile, during this brief period, it will be easy by 

 Act of Congress in advance to limit imi)ortations at Sitka, so that this 

 "free port" shall not be made the channel or doorway by which British 

 goods maj^ be introduced into the United States free of duty. 



GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS ON THE TREATY. 



From this survey of the Treaty, as seen in its origin and the ques- 

 tions under it, I might pass at once to a survey of the possessions which 

 have been conveyed; but there are other matters of a more general 

 cliaracter which present themselves at this stage and challenge the 

 judgment. These concern nothing less than tlie unity, power, and 

 grandeur of the Kepublic, with the extension of its dominion and its 

 institutions. Such considerations, where not entirely inapplicable, are 

 a])t to be controlling. I do not doubt that they will in a great measure 

 determine the fate of this Treaty with the American people. They are 

 patent, and do not depend on research or statistics. To state them is 

 enough. 



ADVANTAGES TO THE PACIFIC COAST. 



1. Foremost in order, if not in importance, I put the desires of our 

 fellow-citizens on the Pacific coast, and the special advantages which 

 they will derive from this enlargement of boundary. They were the 

 lii'st to ask for it, ami will be the lirst to profit by it. While others 

 knew the Hnssian possessions only on the map they knew them practi- 

 cally in tlielr resources. While others were still indifferent they were 

 planning how to appropriate Eussian peltries and fisheries. This is 

 attested by the Eesolutions of the Legislature of Washington Terri- 

 tory; also by the exertions at different times of two Senators from 

 Calii^Drnia, who, differing in political sentiments and in party relations, 

 took the initial steps which ended in this Treaty. 



These well-known desires were founded, of course, on supposed advan- 

 tages; and here experience and neighbourhood were prompters. Since 

 1854 the people of California have received their ice from the fresh- 

 water lakes in the Island of Kodiak, not far westward from Mount St. 

 Elias. Later still their fishermen have searched the waters about the 

 Aleutians and the Shumagins, commencing a promising fishery. Others 

 have i)roposed to substitute themselves to the Hudson Bay Company in 

 their franchise on the coast. I>ut all are looking to the Orient, as in 

 the time of Columbus, although like him they sail to the West. To theui 

 China and Japan, those ancient realms of fabulous wealth, are the Indies. 

 To draw this commerce to the Pacific coast is no new idea. It haunted 

 the early navigators. Meares, the Englishman, whose voyage in the 

 intervening seas was in 1789, closes his volumes with an essay, entitled 

 "The Tiade between the North- West Coast of America and China," in 

 the course of which he dwells on the "great and very valuable source 



