256 AVES ISLAND. 



cepting the provisions in relation to neutral rights, that it is " an able 

 declaratory exposition of the common maritime international law of 

 Europe." 



And it has even been contended that letters of special reprisals issued 

 to an individual subject, for injuries committed by a foreign State, 

 were not revocable by a domestic act, and even if a war intervened 

 before final execution, that they were not revoked by a subsequent 

 treaty of peace between the two countries till satisfaction was had 

 upon them, and the power of the king to revoke such letters before 

 such satisfaction was had, was even questioned by some eminent Eng- 

 lish common law jurists. (See 1 Molloy, c. 2, § 8, as to revocations. 

 King vs. Caren, 3 Swan, 669. 1 Vern., 54, 55, parch., 1682.) 



In the reign of Edward II., according to Lord Campbell in his 

 "Lives of the Lord Chancellors of England," vol. 1, p. 205, the power 

 of issuing letters of marque and reprisal against a foreign State that 

 denied a delayed justice to Englishmen, resided in the high court of 

 chancery, and those letters were in the nature of a judicial process, 

 and the property captured was detained as a pledge or security till 

 justice was rendered by the offending State. 



The reasonable term in which an answer is to be required, of course 

 depends on the character and circumstances of the case, the contiguity 

 of the respective governments, &c. In Europe, as to ordinary cases 

 of spoliation, four or six months from the allowance of the application 

 from the injured party to his government is the longest term designa- 

 ted in which such answer should be made. (See Wildman Inst., c. 

 5, p. 190,-&c.) 



In the present case the spoliation was committed in J854, nearly 

 three years ago. Our claim for damages was presented to the Depart- 

 ment of State of the United States, January 15, 1855, so soon as we 

 became apprised of the outrage. We have diligently followed up that 

 demand for justice by reiterated applications to the same department 

 since that day^, and by furnishing to it from time to time proofs by 

 depositions of numerous witnesses, and by documents of different 

 kinds, some obtained from Europe, all of which, careless of any advan- 

 tage the same might afford to Venezuela, we asked should be forth- 

 with furnished to that government. So unremitted have been our 

 efforts, that we have on more than one occasion received from the 

 department something like a rebuke for our importunity and for 

 cumulating such proofs unnecessarily, and in certain public prints we 

 have been reproached with "pestering" and "bothering" the depart- 

 ment improperly with respect to our indemnity ; and, besides all this, 

 we have, with the assent of the department, and, in fact, at its sug- 

 gestion, at an additional expense of several thousand dollars, dispatched 

 an agent to Caraccas to obtain, if practicable, a compromise of our just 

 claim and its settlement upon something approaching reasonable 

 terms, and yet it has not resulted in effecting any promise by Venez- 

 uela to indemnify us in any degree or any concession of their liability; 

 and, on the contrary, the government of the United States and our- 

 selves have as yet only received in answer the repudiation of our claim 

 upon the most frivolous pretexts, coupled with indignity and insult to 

 the representative of the United States in relation to it. 



