82 ARGUMENTS ON PRELIMINARY MOTIONS. 



I yesterday called attention to page 11 of the British Case (tlie bottom 

 of page 10 and the top of page 11), Avhere the snbject isbrietly adverted 

 to; bnt if tlie Tribunal will be good enough to turn to page 135, chapter 

 VIII, the Tribunal will hud that we have discussed this question of 

 property, so tar as it was possil)le for us to do it in the then condition 

 of things. For what was our position? Our position was and is, this: 

 the claim of property is unprecedented. This claim of property is novel. 

 It linds no warrant, as we contend, in law. You do not contend that 

 seals are animals /era; »«/?//•«?. You do not contend that. You admit 

 that they are not — at least I think so, I know you do not contend that 

 they are: but at least you do not deny that they are animals ferce 

 natura'. Whether that will be denied or not, I really do not know, but 

 we did not conceive that it could be denied, and thereupon I want to 

 ask the Tribunal whether we were called ui)on, whether we could with 

 propriety be expected to do more tlian to point out as we have done in 

 chapter YIII the general i^rinciples which apply to property, and how 

 property could be acquired in animals of that class, and to point out 

 that according to our conception of those principles they had no rele- 

 vance to the claim of the United States, and did not support their claim 

 of proi)erty in the fur seals. Was it to be expected tliat we were with 

 the necessarily imperfect information at our command at that time — to 

 a large extent imperfect — to know w^hat were the conditions of seal life, 

 the incidents of seal life as to the going and the coming, the length of 

 residence on the islands, their migratory return to the ocean — were we 

 to set up hypothetically the incidents relating to that seal life which 

 we might expect might be relied upon by the United States, in order 

 to meet them? 



I say that would have been illogical and more. I think it would have 

 been entirely impro])er. We state our general principles. We say you 

 do not come within those principles as far as we know; and when they 

 do advance the grounds, as they do at the later stage, when we see their 

 Case, and when we know the grounds upon which they put them, then 

 we meet them as fully as we can meet them in the Counter Case pre- 

 sented. And now. Sir, I have got, I am glad to say, very close to the 

 end of the argument with which I have had at this great length to 

 trouble you. 



But 1 desire to say something upon the point of what is the meaning 

 of evidence in Article VII: " shall be laid before them with such other 

 evidence as either (Government may submit". It will be observed by 

 the Tribunal that two questions arise in relation to this Supplementary 

 Eeport. One only can be dealt with by this motion, namely, whether 

 any evidence at all not in the Case and Counter Case can be submitted. 

 The second point wiiether, if any evidence can be admitted, as we sug- 

 gest it can and ought, whether tliis particular Supplementary Report is 

 evidence, is, of course another question, and that you cannot judge (it 

 is obvious) until you see what it is; and therefore the sole question that 

 can be dealt with here is, whether any evidence touching regulations (I 

 hope the Tribunal understands that) touching regulations: conversant 

 with nothing else but regulations: diiected and intended to be used for 

 no purpose except regulations: whether any evidence of that kind 

 can at all be submitted and can be and ought to be received. It there- 

 fore is clear that, for the purposes of the present motion, it is to be 

 assumed that the Supplementary Report is evidence within the meaning 

 of Article VII. 



The question, therefore, is narrowed, so far as this motion is concerned, 

 to the question whether any evideiu'e can be admitted which relates to 

 regulations, and which is not to be found in the Case or Counter Case. 



