ORAL ARGUMENT OF SIR RICHARD WEBSTER, Q, C. M. P. 463 



I notice in passing:, so that I need not call ^ittention to it again, that 

 this is the only charter in which the words "foreign subjects" appear. 

 It was in consequence of the attempt by Russia to extend her rights 

 under the Ukase of 1821. If you will now turn over to page 62, you will 

 find how the areaof the monopoly of the Russian Company was described 

 in the year 1829 after the Treaty. 51° was no longer possible, because 

 they had agreed with the United States that the southern limit of their 

 operations should be 54° 40'. 



The limits of iiavijj^ation and industry of the Company are determined by the 

 Treaties concluded ^Yith the United States of America, April 5 (17), 1824, and with 

 England, February 16 (28), 1825. 



(3) In all the places allotted to Russia by these treaties there shall be reserved to 

 the Company the right toprotit by all the fur and fish industries to the exclusion of all 

 other liussian subjects. 



Could anybody produce the slightest authoiity for the suggestion 

 that the Company lost their monopoly on the east side of Behring Sea? 

 There is not a vestige of evidence, and I speak challenging correction 

 by my learned friend Mr. Phelps, and asking him to refer to any docu- 

 ment showing that it was not intended to convey the monopoly to the 

 Russian Company from Behring Straits to 54° 40'. In 1799, it was 

 down to 55°; and, in 1821, it was down to 51° in terms; and, in 1829, 

 it is the whole area assigned to Russia. It must have been, and was, the 

 whole North- West Coast of America above 54° 40', which was the part 

 exclusively assigned to Russia, as compared to that below, which was ex- 

 clusively assigned to the United States. Observe that 54° 40' was to 

 be the dividing line, and yet it is necessary, for the purpose of my 

 learned friends' argument, for them to contend for the first time that 

 of which there is not a trace during 100 years of the history of this mat- 

 ter, that the Russian Company had not the monopoly on the eastern 

 shore of Behring Sea, 



Now, look at page G3 of the Counter Case, where you will observe 

 the renewal suggested in the year 1865 : 



The Minister proposed, in paragraph 15, to reserve to the Company the exclusive 

 right of engaging in the fur- trade as defined within the following limits: 



On the peninsula of Alaska, reckoning as its northern limit a line drawn from 

 Cape Douglas, in Kenia Bay, to the head of Lake Iniiamna; on all the islands lying 

 along the coast of that peninsula; on the Aleutian, Commander, and Kurile Islands 

 and those lying in Behring's Sea, and also along the whole western coast of Beh- 

 ring's Sea. 



I had better show you where that is. The line goes across the 

 Alaskan peninsula; and what they intended to give to the Russian 

 Company was the Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands in Behring Sea, 

 the west coast and what they proposed to take away from them was, 

 down to 54° 40' and the eastern side of the Behring Sea. And the 

 United States suggest the Russian people did not know what they 

 were talking about, and that "eastern" meant "western"; the words 

 are — 



in the district to the north-east of the peninsula of Alaska along the whole coast to 

 the boundary of the British possessions — 



that, of course, means from about Kadiak Island, where the line comes 

 out, to 54° 40',— 



also on the islands lying along this coast, including in that number Sitka and th© 

 whole Koloshian archipelago, and also on land, to the northern extremity of the Ameri- 

 can Continent, the privilege granted to the Company of the exclusive prosecution of 

 the said industry and traffic. 



Or, in other words, they were to have nothing on the North-West 

 Coast of America south and east of Kadiak Island or north of the 



