ARGUMENTS ON PRELIMINARY MOTIONS. 143 



both parties luive expended more already in tins Arbitration than it all 

 comes to, and I do not conceive that an Arbitration ever would have 

 been resorted to between the Governments for so small a subject as 

 that. That is all I meant to say. I beg- pardon for interrupting you, 

 Sir Charles. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — Il^ot at all. Allow me to point out what the 

 state of things was. Up to 1800 my learned friend seemed to hesitate 

 and to doubt what seizures had been effected; and he treats it as an 

 inconsiderable matter. 



Mr. Phelps. — Comparatively. 



Sir Chahles Kussell. — I beg to observe that, in 1886, there had 

 been a seizure of four British vessels, confiscation, imprisonment of 

 their sailors and captains, or some of them; in 1887, there had been 

 seven seizures, making, with the first four, eleven. In 1889 there had 

 been eight seizures, making nineteen. In 1890, there were further 

 seizures; and yet my learned friend suggests two extraordinary propo- 

 sitions; first of all, that the British Government, denying from the 

 beginning to the end the claim of right of the United States, were 

 yet willing, if Eegulations were agreed to, to submit to this action, 

 which they claim to have been illegal action and without warrant in 

 law, without justifying the claim of their nationals to compensation in 

 damages. 



Mr. Phelps. — Oh ! no. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — And next he commits the United States to 

 this extraordinary position, that they were willing to give up their asser- 

 tions of right of jurisdiction, stated in the first four questions, and 

 their assertion of property in the seals, or in the individual seals, or in 

 the herd, or in the "industry," provided Eegulations could have been 

 conventionally agreed to. 



Mr. Carter. — To waive them, — not to give them up. 



Mr. Phelps.— In 1887. 



Sir Charles Eussell. — I, therefore, have shewn that, in the very 

 next month (the correspondence overlapping the period in which there 

 was the question as to the Convention with a view to Eegulations to 

 which Eussia was to be a party), there was contemiioraneously with it 

 the negotiation going on between the United States and Great Britain 

 alone as to the question of Arbitration upon damages, which necessarily 

 involved questions of right, and there are questions of right expressly 

 mentioned besides. But, further, I have shewn that, after the date I 

 inentioned, the question of the Convention disappears from sight alto- 

 gether, and that after that the discussion is solely conversant with mat- 

 ters leading up to and ending in the Treaty consummated on the 29th of 

 February, 1892. To suggest that you are to get the means of constru- 

 ing the Treaty of 1892 from negotiations thus pending dealing with 

 different subjects two years before, does I submit lead this Tribunal 

 very far afield indeed; and is the introduction of matter which cannot 

 be considered relevant or pertinent, even if it serve to help the purpose 

 for which my learned friends are using it. Lastly, and it is the con- 

 cluding document, although I should invite the Tribunal to read all 

 these documents if they have any doubt about it, — lastly, I will read 

 this document of June, 1890; and recollect my learned friend is relying 

 on what took place in 1890. This is what took place in June, 1890. 



It is from Sir Julian Pauncefote to Mr. Blaine at page 510 of the 

 volume which you have before you in N" 378. " I <lid not fail to trans- 

 mit to the Marquis of Salisbury" he says to Mr. Blaine: " a copy of your 

 note of the 11th instant, in which, with reference to his Lordship's 



