278 AVES ISLAND. 



most excellent Secretary of State the protestations of his highest con- 

 sideration and respect. 



His obedient servant, 



FLOEENCIO RIBAS. 

 Most Excellent Mr. Lewis Cass, 



Secretary of State, dc. 



3Ir. Cass to Mr. Rib as. 



Department of State, 

 Washington, September 11, 1857. 



Sir: I have had the honor to receive your communication of the 4th 

 instant, in which you inform the department of the circumstances under 

 which Mr. Eames, the American minister, left Qaraccas on the 13th 

 of June, and of the intention which your government then had of 

 transmitting through you its decision in reference to the claim of 

 Messrs. Shelton et als., who were evicted from "Aves" island in 1854 

 by the Venezuelan authorities. It is deeply to he regretted that this 

 decision has not yet arrived, because the case is one of peculiar aggra- 

 vation, and has now been pending for more than two years and a half. 

 What you say of the comparative business of a Department of State 

 and a legation, is undoubtedly true;, but it is difficult to see how much 

 time could be required in the "Aves" case in order to determine the 

 preliminary question of liability, whatever investigation might be 

 necessary to adjust the amount of damages. About the prominent facts 

 upon which the claim is based, there is no controversy. The discovery 

 by the claimants of guano on the island, their preparations for work- 

 ing it, their peaceable possession of the locality, the dispatch of an 

 armed force by Venezuela in order to evict them, without notice to the 

 United States, and the accomplishment of this design by the force 

 employed, |are facts too clearly proved to be susceptible of doubt. The 

 report of the officers who had charge of the expedition sent out must have 

 been made to the Venezuelan authorities soon after its return, and all the 

 facts in the case must, therefore, have been long known at Caraccas. 



Yet, so far has Venezuela been from acknowledging the wrong done 

 to our citizens and expressing its willingness to make just compensa- 

 tion for it, that it has indicated a disposition, on the contrary, to 

 justify the expedition by intimating a claim of title and a right of 

 possession to the island. It is not believed, however, that this claim 

 can be deliberately insisted on, because it is impossible to discover any 

 good reason to sustain it. It does not appear that the island was ever 

 occupied by Venezuela or by the citizens of that republic. It was 

 never inhabited, and was not capable of supporting a permanent popu- 

 lation. There was nothing about it whatever which could lead Messrs. 

 Shelton & Co. to believe that Venezuela had a claim to it. It was not 

 contiguous to the Venezuelan coast, but was more than three hundred 

 miles distant from it, and much nearer to the possessions of other 

 countries than to Venezuela. Under such circumstances, knowing, as 



