AVES ISLAND. 319 



upon liim, lie has withal always alleged, probably to justify the con- 

 duct of the Americans, that Aves Island, though it may have been 

 discovered in remote times, was never taken into the possession nor 

 brought under the jurisdiction of any power ; that it was a thing dere- 

 lict, and that, therefore, the discoverers of the guano on that island 

 had a right to appropriate it to themselves, without detriment to any 

 one. But one of two things, either this proposition ought not to have 

 been laid down, or, laid down, it ought to have been backed by the 

 necessary proof ; because the onus probandi was either incumbent upon 

 Venezuela, as has been pretended, and, in that case, the Americans 

 were not bound to open their lips even in their own behalf, or the bur- 

 den lay on the Americans, and, in this view, little would it have 

 availed them to allege the exception. It is an axiom of jurisprudence 

 that he who avails himself of an exception passes from the attitude of 

 a defendant to that of a plaintiff, and assumes all the obligations of 

 the latter. Certainly it would be very just to invade the property of 

 another man, and then say to the owner, '^this is mine, if you do not 

 prove to me that it is yours ! " 



Mr. Eames insists that Venezuela is the aggressor, and that the 

 claimants are the victims. This no doubt grows out of the fact, that 

 he takes for granted the very question in debate. The question 

 whether the island is, or is not, a portion of the public domain ; 

 whether it belongs to the country or to the Americans, and, in either 

 case, he avers the contrary. (?) He argues con., and the republic 

 maintains the 'pro. She maintains that the real aggressors were the 

 explorers, the invaders, and usurpers of another one's property. She 

 argues that they were the violators of the principles of the law of 

 nations, and of the laws above adduced ; that they were those who, in 

 an armed attitude, without authority from any sovereign^ in the pros- 

 ecution of a voyage of discovery to guano islands, introduced them- 

 selves in Aves, Hermanos, Testigos, Ivlunjes, and other groups of Ven- 

 ezuelan islands ; that they were those Avho held no consideration in 

 respect ; those who failed to take the most obvious precautions in the 

 act of proceeding in a hazardous undertaking ; those who cloaked their 

 operations in darkness ; those who skulked from the most visible parts 

 to go to others that were less so ; those who had not the hardihood to 

 defend themselves, even by the allegation of the merest right; those 

 who confessed their wrong ; those who resorted to beseechings, so that 

 they might be allowed to take in more guano; those who left their 

 own to enter the country of another people ; those who were found 

 armed at all points ; those who had gathered together a large number 

 of laborers ; those who, in the act of entering a foreign territory, com- 

 mitted an act of violence; those who, in vindication of their conduct, 

 have not alleged a single, w^ell established reason ; those who readily 

 yielded to the merest intimation to them to depart ; those who sponta- 

 neously admitted the absence of all title on their part, and the exist- 

 ence of Venezuela's dominion; those who forewent the sacred right of 

 lawful defense to resist the supposed interruption of their pursuit ; 

 those who committed other depredations, if possible; those, finally, 

 who, as the sum of these observations wdll show, have stood forth in 

 the light, and with all the characteristics, of piracy. 



