ORAL ARGUMENT OF HON. EDWARD J. PHELPS. 155 



So, on the other hand, if you cull this correspondence you will find 

 plenty of instances in which casual exi)ressioiis are used which would 

 look oneway or the other — (I attribute no iinpoitance to them on either 

 side); but when you j»o to maps of geographers from whom wc get all 

 our ideas of geography, atlases, charts, maps and so forth conveying 

 and embodying all the knowledge there is — when you come to find out 

 where they drew the line, then you are approaching the answer to the 

 question; what is commonly called the Pacific Ocean? 



Then in the consideration of maps there is a turther discrimination to 

 be made, and that will reconcile, in a striking degree, what is, on the 

 threshold, to a superficial observer, the conflict between these sets of 

 maps. A person who has not taken the trouble to analyse them will 

 snppose that there is a great conflict in this evidence — that there is 

 really an enormous conflict: a great manymai^s say one thing — a great 

 many say another. When you come to analyse, you look at the maps 

 and consider what the map is dealing with, what it is undertaking to 

 show — discriminating those that are authoritative — that are made upon 

 authority, that are made deliberately, from little maps that are attached 

 to hooks of travel, or to elucidate something which does not require 

 this distinction to be made. 



Now my friend's tactics (if it is not disrespectful to apply a military 

 term to the conduct of a controversy), all through this case, are what may 

 be known as the "battalion system" of witnesses. As I shall have 

 occasion to i)oint out iu a great many instances, he has a battalion. 

 They are all in formation. The efi'ect of them is tremendous. We have 

 100 to 150 witnesses swearing to the fact. Are you going to doubt that 

 fact? It is not until you calltbe roll of this battalion and let each man 

 stand out by himself that you find a large share of them swear directly 

 the other way, — another large share do not swear at all — that those 

 who really su]>port the point as to which they are called, become so 

 insignificant that the battalion shrinks into a corporal's guard. 



It is exactly so with these maps. I was appalled (supposing that 1 

 had some idea of what the merits of this question was), when I found 

 there were some 136 maps that apparently on the face of this case defined 

 this boundary diflerently from what I had supposed. It is not until 

 you analyse the 13G that you find what the result is. To begin with, 

 and to find' out what these men meant in 1824 by "commonly called", 

 we may dismiss subsequent maps. They were talking about the geog- 

 raphy of the world as it was understood then. Geography and geo- 

 graphical terms change as everything else does. We should, few of us, 

 recognize maps by which we began the study of geography, as apidy- 

 ing to the world at the present time, though th^ world is very much the 

 same as it was then. I discard the subsequent maps, and address myself 

 to the consideration of the majjs that were then considered authorative — 

 that you may assume in the absence of evidence, guided the views of 

 intelligent people as to these geographical distinctions. So let us con- 

 sider the maps between 1800 and 1823, the American Treaty being 

 in 1824. Then let us remember that these two countries naturally — not 

 to the exclusion of other maps — look at their own; the first resort of a 

 country intelligent enough to have scientific maps and publications is 

 to its own maps. Take the Eussian maps for instance and I shall 

 dispose of what there is to say about that before the recess. There are 

 eleven Russian maps cited. 



Mr. Justice Haiilan. — On both sides. 



