170 ARGUMENT OP THE UNITED STATES. 



stricken places to make signals on meeting - other ships, i leagues from 

 coast, (26 Geo. II, Ch. — .) 



Another act establishes 2 leagues from the coast as the distance 

 within which ships are amenable to the British quarantine regula- 

 tions. (6 Geo. IV, ch. 78.) 



Another act of the British Parliament affords a conspicuous instance 

 of ft control exercised over the high sea, for a long distance outside the 

 utmost boundary of a littoral sea, as a means of a defense against a 

 special danger then thought to exist. It was passed and enforced for 

 the purpose of preventing the escape of the Emperor Napoleon when 

 confined on the island of St. Helena. 



This act authorized the seizure and condemnation of all vessels found 

 hovering within 6' leagues or 24 miles of the coast of St. Helena during 

 the captivity of Napoleon Bonaparte on the island, reserving to ships 

 owned exclusively by foreigners the privilege of first being warned to 

 depart before they could legally be seized and condemned. (56 Geo. 

 Ill, ch. 23; Case of the United States, App., vol. 1, p. 495.) 



A still more extensive and very recent assumption of dominion over 

 the sea for defensive and fiscal purposes, is to be found in an act passed 

 by the legislature of Queensland on June 24, 1879, which annexed to 

 that country all the islands lying off the northeastern coast of Austra- 

 lia, within a defined limit, which, at its furthest point, extends 250 

 miles out to sea. 



The boundary thus adopted includes nearly the whole of Torres 

 Strait, a body of water (50 miles in width, separating Australia from 

 New Guinea, and forming the connecting link between the Pacific and 

 Indian oceans. 



Under the authority of this Annexation Act, the Government of 

 Queensland has exercised complete police jurisdiction over the Strait, 

 has suppressed the traffic in liquor in the objectionable form in which 

 it formerly prevailed, and has derived from the traffic as since restrict- 

 ed, a large revenue through the medium of customs duties. (43 Vict., 

 ch. 1. Rep. U. S. Fish Com. See "Gold-Gems and Pearls in Ceylon 

 and Southern India," by A. M. & I., 18S8, p. 296.) (Case of the 

 United States, App. Vol. I, p. 467.) 



An effort is made in the British counter case to diminish the force of 

 the various statutes, regulations and decrees above cited, by the sug- 

 gestions that they only take effect within the municipal jurisdiction 

 of the couutries where they are promulgated, and upon the citizens of 



