ORAL ARGUMENT OF SIR RICHARD WEBSTER, Q. C. M. P. 91 



Sir EiCHARD Webster. — Tkuow; but yon do really have telegrams 

 sometimes. The fact is that Ilussia insists upon her right to seize ves- 

 sels whose boats have actually been sealing in territorial waters, and 

 does not insist, but on the contrary pays compensation to those vessels 

 whose boats they could not prove to have been inside territorial waters. 

 What complaint there can be, I cannot understand. 



The President. — Of course we do not doubt your assertion per- 

 sonally, but it is a personal assertion. 



Sir Eichard Webster. — You must not say my personal assertion, 

 Sir. 



The President. — You bring- it personally forward. 



Sir Eichard Webster. — You will be good enough to understand. 

 Sir, that it is not my personal assertion — it is a statement made by the 

 learned Attorney General speaking of a communication made to him in 

 his official capacity from the Foreign Office. You must not put it on 

 me — I mean to say a communication would not come to me — it came 

 to the learned Attorney-General, and was read by him. 



Mr. Carter. — We must not admit the right of Counsel on the other 

 side to read communications (by whatever name they may be called) 

 merely from the Foreign Office of Great Britain. They are communi- 

 cations perhaps stating facts which may be deemed of greater or less 

 importance to the inquiry here, and facts therefore which it may be 

 necessary for us to meet. We have not a Foreign Office within twelve 

 hours communication. We cannot communicate with Eussia for the 

 jjurpose of ascertaining what the full facts were. 



It certainly will not be permitted by this Tribunal, I should supi^ose, 

 that a partial view of facts may be presented here without any oppor- 

 tunity to the other side to make that view full and complete — that 

 surely is not the way in which the question should be brought before 

 this Tribunal. Therefore we feel bound here to object generally to the 

 introduction of new evidence which certainly must be considered to be 

 irregular; and inasmuch as no provision is made for it by the Treaty — 

 and it is particularly irregular as we think for Counsel to get up on the 

 other side and offer new evidence without even asking the jiermission 

 of the Tribunal for doing so — getting it in simply without provision, 

 before the Tribunal, for what it is worth. That of course we must be 

 understood most distinctly objecting to, and hope it will not be 

 permitted. 



Sir Eichard Webster. — I would rather abstain from answering 

 any complaint of my friend Mr. Carter. I have not, by my assertion — 

 nor has my learned friend the Attorney General sought in any way to 

 introduce fresh evidence. He has simply sought — and I should submit 

 to the Tribunal for their judgment ijroperly sought — to remove an 

 impression which would have been made upon the minds of the Tri- 

 bunal, by a passage in Mr. Phelps' argument for which we knew there 

 was no foundation. 



Mr. Carter. — If there was no foundation for it, that could easily be 

 shown. 



Sir Eichard Webster. — But I say — my friends have the fullest 

 notice now — if we had made any mistake, they have the same means 

 of communication that we have. 



Mr. Phelps.— With the Foreign Office? 



Mr. Tupper. — With Eussia. 



Sir Eichard Webster. — With their own Foreign Minister in Eus- 

 sia. But really, Mr. Phelps, I am sure you will understand what I 

 mean — that there is no ground for the suggestion that my learned 

 friend the Attorney General, (in stating that which he knew to be the 



