SEVENTEENTH DAY, MAY 4™, 1893. 



Tlie President. — If you are ready to proceed, Mr. Coudert, we are 

 ready to hear you. 



Mr. CouDEiiT. — I had the honour to call the attention of the Tribunal 

 yesterday, before the adjournment, to the diflBculty which any lawyer 

 must hnd in making- clear the issues in the case. If we had any plead- 

 ings to guide us, we might on both sides bring down all the points and 

 facts to one or two or a few questions; but when there are many aver- 

 ments on the one side and only vague admissions or denials on the 

 other, we are necessarily put to the necessity, where material facts are 

 involved, of going over the whole case. 



This must be my apology if, in discussing these matters, I should take 

 tijne and occupy the attention of the Court in arguing questions which 

 I may find hereafter not to be questions in the case. Indeed from a 

 statement of our distinguished adversary. Sir Charles Russell, I am 

 inclined to believe that most of the propjsitions of fact, which have 

 been laid down by my Associate Mr. Carter and which I mean to 

 sustain by proof, will be admitted by him so far as they relate to seal- 

 life; but, upon a vague statement of that kiiul of which I may not per- 

 fectly apprehend the meaning and extent, I cannot forbear going some- 

 what extensively into the proofs. 



Not only is there an absence of pleadings to guide the counsel and 

 the Court, but there is a mis-statement (1 use it of course in the most 

 courteous sense) a misapprehension on the part of the counsel on the 

 other side of the real issues in the case — at least if they do not misap- 

 prehend them we do. The lawyers who drew tliis being lawyers, and 

 understanding how important it was that we should come before the 

 Court with issues, that is with allegations of an allirmative character 

 on the one side and denial on the other, have stated the points of dif- 

 ference as they understood them to exist: they say that the issues are 

 clear. This is on page 5 of the argument of the British Counsel : 



Was the Government legally jnstitied in seizing British vessels engaged in pelagic 

 sealing in Bebriug Sea outside territorial waters? 



Now I make bold to say that there is no such issue in this case. Nay 

 I go fnrther and say that we are forbidden to discuss, and this high 

 Court is not authorized to decide, the issue thns stated in the argument 

 of the Counsel. Both nations reserved that question, or tliose questions 

 to themselves and although I am free to confess that the decision of this 

 high Tribnnal, on the questions of fact, may have, and, no doubt, wil], 

 have a most imi)ortant bearing on any dii)lonnvtic adjustment hereafter 

 to be made, yet all those matters which relate to liability are expressly 

 excluded by' the terms of the Treaty; and, therefore, I shall not under- 

 take to discuss the (piestion which our friends on the other side say is 

 the only question in the case. I have thought it necessary to state this 

 at the outset, because if our friends are correct in their statement of 

 what the issues are, then we are entirely wrong, and our discussion 

 should follow an entirely different course. Whether the vessels were 

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