30 AVES ISLAND. 



that appears to impeach his character for dealing fairly and above- 

 board with his fellow men, ought to feel. 



It appears from your letter that it is inferred or considered at the 

 department that when we wrote our letter, dated Wasliington, Feb- 

 ruary 26, transmitting theDias "permit," or "license," or "notice," 

 (styled by you ' ' tliis agreement j") we tacitly confirmed it and acquiesced 

 in it as an ^^ agreement" by our agent, insomuch "a^ the department 

 cannot discover in that letter any expression indicating that it was not 

 a voluntary proceeding of your [our \ agents, or that it luas signed under 

 c?Mress/'and insomuch, also, as we '^^ failed to disavow or protest against 

 the concession or acknowledgments of your \our'\ agents. ' ' 



In answer to this we would observe, that in inclosing that paper we 

 designated it as a "license," or "permit," signed by Domingo Dias, 

 commander, &c.; we could not properly style it "an agreement." It 

 loas not signed by any person but Dias. We transmitted the original 

 given to Captain Gibbs by Dias, having Dias' s signature affixed to it, 

 and no other. It would have been absurd to have impeached Dias's 

 signature as having been " signed under duress," or for any other 

 cause ; and the necessity or propriety of expressions indicating that 

 that paper was not a " voluntary proceeding of our agents," or of 

 disavowing and protesting against any concessions or acknowledg- 

 ments of our agents therein or thereby made, is not yet discovered by 

 us. Indeed, as we think it is patent on the face oithat paper that it 

 was exclusively a proceeding of Dias, and did not purport to be any- 

 thing else, and as our agents had not signed it or concurred in it, or 

 thereby and therein made any "concessions or acknowledgments 

 whatever," such "expressions," "disavowal," and "protest" would 

 have been simply ridiculous. We regarded the paper as an ex parte 

 production, drafted in Spanish by Dias solely, agreed to and signed 

 by himself alone, and according to his own fancy, as a sort of military 

 or naval proclamation or pronunciamento, or. bulletin of his acts and 

 doings and purposes, announcing also in military and naval style the 

 terms he felt disposed in his generosity to extend to our agent and the 

 line of operations he proposed to pursue in respect of our employes and 

 property on the island. Mark ! the first that is heard in this case of 

 the other paper, asserted to be dated the same 13th of December at the 

 same "Ma de Aves de Barlovento," and to be signed by Gibbs as well as 

 by Dias, and also by C. H. Lang, is in your letter of the 14th instant, 

 which states that it has been produced by the Venezuelan officials to 

 meet Mr. Eames, in which, however, it is quite evident the two papers 

 are confounded as one and the same. 



What we gather from your letter of the character of this paper, 

 called by you " this agreement," and from, the account of a friend who 

 has examined the copy transmitted to your department, it appears to 

 be a regular military or naval capitidation, or surrender by Gibbs as 

 agent for Sampson & Tappan and Philo S. Shelton, of Boston, and by 

 C. H. Lang, as agent for Lang & Delano, of Boston, to Dias, of the 

 isle, and all their artillery, armaments, &c., thereon^ signed and exe- 

 cuted by all three — the agents in behalf of their respective " compa- 

 nies," and Dias in behalf of the " supreme government of the republic 

 of Venezuela, as captain of its navy and second chief of its squadron, 



