APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 409 



Mr. Middletou uovr tells mo, wliat I was not before aware of, that lie 

 had last year, by the direction of the President, several interviews with 

 Count Nesselrode and Count Capodistrias upon the subject of this 

 Ukase, and that it was at length agreed that he should inquire officially 

 what were the intentions of tlie Imperial Government in regard to the 

 execution of it, an assurance being previously given that the answer 

 which he should receive would be satisfactory. Mr. Middleton has been 

 good enough to furnish me with a copy of this answer, which I 

 41 now inclose. As, however, he considers the comnumicatiou of 

 the paper as personally coniidential, I take the liberty of request- 

 ing that no public use may be made of it. 



In regard to the second part of this question, that which relates to 

 the territorial claiiji advanced by Eussia in respect to the north-west 

 coasts of ISTorth America, I have explained to Count Nesselrode that 

 the United States making no pretension to territory so high as the 51st 

 degree of north latitude, the question rests between His Majesty and 

 the Emperor of Eussia alone, and becomes therefore a matter for 

 separate settlement by their respective Governments. 



I have suggested to him that this settlement uuiy perhaps be best 

 made by Convention, and I have declared our readiness to accede to 

 one framed either u]ion the principle of joint occupancy or demarcation 

 of boundary as the Eussian Government may itself prefer, intimating, 

 however, that in our view the latter is by far the most convenient. 

 Count jSTesselrode immediately and without hesitation declared himself 

 to be entirely of that opinion, and he assured me that the chief if not the 

 only object of the Imperial Government was to be upon some certainty 

 in this respect. 



This conversation took place before I had received your private letter 

 in cypher of the 25th of last nionth, which reached me on the 11th 

 instant by post. I had, however, taken upon myself to abstain from 

 bringing forward any suggestion that the territorial arrangement should 

 be made for an ex})irable period, as I thought it possible that such an 

 arrangement might, in the end, be found to be inconvenient, and as it 

 appeared to me that it was a proposition which I should at all events 

 reserve for a later period of the discussion, when it might, in case of 

 difticulties, be found an useful instrument of negotiation. 



In a second interview which I have had with Count iS'esselrode u})on 

 the subject of this separate negotiation, I told him that our pretensions 

 had, I believed, always extended to the 59th degree of north latitude, 

 but that a line of demarcation drawn at the 57th degree would be 

 entirely satisfactory to us, and that I believed that the Eussian Gov- 

 ernment had in fact no Settlements to the southward of that line. I 

 am not, however, quite sure that I am right in this last assertion, as 

 the Eussian Settlement of Sitka, to which I am told that the Eussian 

 Government pretends to attach great im})ortance, is not laid down 

 very precisely in the Map published in 1802 in the Quartermaster- 

 General's Department here, or laid down at all in that of Arrowsm.ith, 

 which has been furnished to me from the Foreign Office. Be thi.-, 

 however, as it may, Count Kesselrode did not appear to be at all 

 startled by the proposition. He said that he was not enough acquainted 

 with the subject to give an immediate answer to it, but he made a 

 Memorandum of what I said, and I hope shortly to be able to ascertain 

 how far this Government may be inclined to accept a more formal 

 proposition founded upon this basis. 



I have, &c. (Signed) Charles Bagot. 



