16 ORAL ARGUMENT OF SIR CHARLES RUSSELL, Q. C. M. P. 



I may supplement this on my own account with another passage. 



I mention the sea-otter last; but in beauty and value it is the iirst. In these 

 respects it far surpasses the river or laml otter, which, thou^ih beantilul and valu- 

 able, must yield the palm. It has also more the manners of the seal, with its fond- 

 ness for sea-washed rocks, and with a maternal all'ectiou almost human. The 

 sea-otter seems to belong exclusively to the North Pacific. Its haunts once extended, 

 as far as the Bay of San Francisco, etc. 



The President. — May I be allowed to remark that the fur-seal 

 which is actually in fashion seems to be used as a successor to the sea- 

 otter. You are aware that in the French language, by the custom of 

 French furriers, a seal skin is called jjcau de loutre, which means otter 

 skin and not seal-skin. No lady would think of asking- for peau de 

 phoque. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — The sea-otter has practically disappeared. 



The President. — Yes; it has practically disappeared. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — It has disai)peared like the buffalo and 

 other animals. 



Mr. CouDERT. — Like the southern seal. 



Senator Morgan. — You made some reference to the statesmanship 

 of Mr. Sumner as being superior to the conception, as I understood 

 you, that there could be any purchase and sale of tislieries in the open 

 sea. That opinion has not always prevailed among the statesmen of 

 the United States, I will say, for the reason particularly that in our 

 Treaty of Peace with Great Britain in 1783 we found it necessary to 

 incorporate in the treaty the following: 



It is agreed that the people of the United States shall continue to enjoy unmo- 

 lested the right to take tish of every kind on the Grand Bank and all the other banks 

 of Newfountlland, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and all other jjlaces in the sea where 

 the inhabitants of both countries are accustomed to tish. 



731) Of course if we had the open natural right of all mankind to 



fish in the sea that provision was entirely unnecessary in that 

 Treaty. It was insisted on and put in. 



The President. — I believe. Senator Morgan, it was an allusion to 

 previous Treaties with France. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — I am much obliged to you, sir. That ques- 

 tion of the disputed fishing rights between the United States and Can- 

 ada on the Eastern coast of America is an illustration or an analogy — 

 1 do not know which to call it — relied upon by my learned friends to 

 which I will come in the proper order of argument; but may I, as it has 

 been introduced in this connection, point out that what I did say in 

 reference to Mr. Sumner and Mr. Sumner's statesmanship was, that the 

 extravagant idea never entered into his head that by acquiring Alaskan 

 territory he was acquiring fishes or other free swimming animals in the 

 sea. That is what 1 think I conveyed, or at all events what I intended 

 to convey; but if I may be permitted to anticipate, the President has 

 rightly, in a sentence, indicated the nature of the question dealt with 

 in the Treaty referred to by Senator Morgan. The state of the case is 

 shortly this: That, in conflict with France, Great Britain, then owning 

 the colonies of America, claimed to have acquired, partly by concession, 

 partly by Treaty : partly by assertion of a right, acquiesced in, though 

 to some extent disputed, certain exclusive rights of fishery. 



Senator Morgan. — But they were a hundred miles away from the 

 coast. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — I do not care where they were, with great 

 deference; it is entirely immaterial to the point I am upon. Then came 

 the American rebellion, and the independence of America. It thereupon 



