APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 417 



in 1807 to be situated, as tlie inclosed copy of a letter from Mr. Pelly, 

 Cliairman of the Hudson's Bay Couipanj^, also represents it, in latitude 

 57°, and not (as the Map of which a copy was inclosed to your Excel- 

 lency indicates) on the continent, but on a small island of the same 

 name at the mouth of Xorfolk Sound; the larger islands contiguous 

 thereto, forming (what is called by Vancouver) King George's Archi- 

 pelago, are sej^arated from each other by a Strait, called Chatham 

 Strait, and from the mainland by another Strait, called Stephen's Strait 

 or passage. Whether the liussians have extended their Settlements 

 to these larger islands is not known, but j\Ir. Pelly positively avers 

 that they have no Settlement on the mainland, nor any commerce to 

 the eastward of the coast. He suggests, therefore, either the channel 

 between the islands, or that between the islands and tlie mainland, as 

 the most desirable line of demarcation to the eastward, which being 

 agreed to, the line to the southward might be drawn so as to compre- 

 hend Sitka and all the Kussian Settlements upon the islands. If this 

 agreement could be obtained, it would eifectually prevent all danger of 

 a collision with Russia ; and the ITuited States not intending, as it is 

 understood, to urge any claim in opposition to tlnit of actuiil occupancy, 

 whether on the x)art of Kussia or of Great Britain, in the latitudes in 

 which the claims of Great Britain and Russia come in contact, the 

 intervention of the United States in such an arrangement could be 

 necessary only as an Umpire. 



Such an intervention in this case is not likely to be required, on 

 account of an irreconcilable contlict between Great Britain and Russia; 

 nor would a Power whose lu'etensions are (theoretically at least) in con- 

 flict with both parties be the fittest for such an ottice. 



Your Excellency's despatch No. 48 describes latitude 5r»o as the point 

 at which M. Poletica appeared to wish that the line of demarcation 

 between Russia and Great Britain should be drawn. By a Memoran- 

 dum which I have received from Mr. Rush of what his Government 

 would propose as a general settlen\ent, it appears that latitude 55° is 

 the point which the United States likewise have proposed for that same 

 line of demarcation. 



This coincidence certainly argues either a foregone understanding 

 between Russia and tlie United States, or a disposition on the part of 

 the United States to countenance and promote what they know to be 

 tlie desire of Russia. 



When to this statement I add that the United States propose, ac^cord- 

 ing to the aforesaid Memorandum of Mr. Rush, to draw the line of 

 demarcation between themselves and Great Britain at latitude 51°, the 

 point at which the Russian pretensicm, as set forth in the Ukase of 1821, 

 terminates, it does not seem very uncharitable to suppose that the 

 object of the United States in making a selection, otherwise wholly 

 arbitrary, of these two points of limitation for British dominion, was 

 to avoid collision with Russia themselves, and to gratify Russia 

 48 at the expense of Great Britain. There is obviously no great 

 temptation to call in such an Arbiter, if the partition between 

 Russia and ourselves can be settled, as no doubt it can, without arbi- 

 tration. 



By admitting the United States to our negotiation with Russia, we 

 should incur the necessity of discussing the American claim to latitude 

 51° at the same time that we were settling with Russia our respective 

 limits to the northward.- 



But the question of the American claim is for the i>resent merged in 

 the Couvention of 1818; and it would be a wanton increase of difficul- 

 S. Ex. 177, pt. 4 27 



