AVES ISLAND. 51 



XrV. DISCOVERY BY PRIVATE CITIZEN VESTS RIGHTS IN THE UNITED STATES, 



It is entirely immaterial whether such discoverer is ?i private citizen 

 or subject, or a commissioned officer of a State. The same rights, in 

 either case, vest in the State to which he belongs. Vattel only refers 

 to discoverers furnished with a commission from their sovereign ; and 

 this was the British argument in the Oregon case ; hut the United 

 States do not hold to such opinion, and Great Britain has not always 

 held it. There are two cases of discovery and occupation by private 

 citizens or subjects, in merchant vessels, that are now recollected as 

 having been contended for as the^ foundation of right, one by Great 

 Britain and the other by the United States. 



The first is the celebrated case respecting Nootka Sound, in 1790, 

 in which a Mr. Mears, a half-pay lieutenant in the British navy, out 

 of service, and sailing a Portuguese merchantman on a private adven- 

 ture, sailed to and occupied Nootka Sound, which, it was said, as well 

 from his discovery and occupation as from prior British discoveries, 

 belonged to Great Britain. 



It will be seen by an examination of the Nootka Sound case, that it 

 resembles the present closely. The place had been discovered and was 

 known when Mears occupied it. Spain had been its actual occupant, 

 but it had been abandoned. Some time after Mears settled there, a 

 Spanish vessel-of-war captured his vessels, and drove him away. The 

 vessels were, however, subsequently restored by the viceroy of Mexico. 

 Mears appealed to the British government for redress, and it was ren- 

 dered forthwith. 



The promptness and energy of the British government in that case 

 affords a wise example for all other nations that have the ability and 

 disposition to maintain their rights. (See British An. Reg.. 1790, pp. 

 185, 305; lb. 1791, pp. 208 to 227 ; "Gentleman's Magazine," 1790 ; 

 Greenhow's Oregon, p. 446, and app.) 



The other case was the discovery, by Captain Gray, in 1792, of the 

 mouth of the Columbia river, he being master of a whale ship. He 

 was a citizen of the United States, and his vessel was an American 

 vessel, and upon his discovery and occupation, and upon continued 

 occupation by Mr. Astor's employes and others^ citizens of the United 

 States, the United States based its right to all that region of country. 



It is true it contended for the right upon other grounds also, but 

 this specific ground was maintained, and Great Britain, then remem- 

 bering to forget the Mears case, and many other similar cases, ques- 

 tioned the principle, that the uncommissioned Yankee skipper of a 

 private merchant vessel could lay the foundation of such a right, and 

 Dr. Phillimore observes with no little naivete, (vol. 1, p. 251,) " If the 

 circumstances had been these, viz : that an actual settlement had been 

 grafted upon a discovery made by an authorized public officer of a 

 nation at the mouth of a river, the law would not have been unrea- 

 sonably applied." §236. 



Other authors and statesmen have maintained the principle, that 

 upon a discovery by a private citizen or subject, the same rights enure 

 to his State as if he was a commissioned officer_, and no one has ques- 

 tioned the principle, that if adopted by his government by occupation, 



