AVES ISLAND. 327 



not describe — was signed througli "bodily fear, and to prevent outrage 

 and bloodshed, without adducing any reason that could produce such 

 fear, nor why, by signing it, they were preventing outrage and blood- 

 shed. Although the foreman of the works, he was not even consulted 

 by Lang and Gibbs, he being, like the former of these, an agent of 

 Lang & Delano. Then he had no reason to inquire into what was 

 occurring. His statement is inaccurate Avhen he swears that the vessel 

 in which Colonel Dias sailed to Aves Island returned thither three 

 weeks afterwards, because Colonel Dias had come on board of the 

 General Falcon, but the latter was the schooner Trece de Diciembre. 



The next declaration is that of Charles H. Lang, foreman to Lang & 

 Delano, and one of those who subscribed the document. The declara- 

 tion is acknowledged in Boston, June 21, 1855, before Samuel Brackett, 

 J. P. He, too, understood Spanish, having sailed for a number of 

 years in the Pacific ocean, along the coasts of Peru; so that, accord- 

 ing to the statement of the officers of Venezuela, they would readily 

 have taken him to be a Spaniard, had he not declared that he was an 

 American. So well did he understand the Spanish language, that he 

 went on correcting a few slight mistakes that had crept into the docu- 

 ment. Besides, neither has he denied this, nor have the witnesses 

 referred to any one but Gibbs, when they speak of not understanding 

 the Spanish language and the explanations which were made of the 

 contents of the paper at the time when it was signed. This is so 

 much the more evident from the fact, that in order to understand 

 Colonel Dias, some interpreter M^as required, as he did not know the 

 English, or they the Spanish, language. 



'^He deposes to the arrival of Dias, who hoisted the Venezuelan flag, 

 in which particular he is in contradiction with Gibbs; and that Dias 

 immediately insisted that they should depart from the island, and, 

 seeing that they were not disposed to go off with such readiness, he 

 made some show of his forces, such as putting his soldiers through the 

 exercise, firing their guns^ &c. That, finally, said Domingo Dias 

 drew up a document in Spanish, copy of which was annexed, ordering 

 the foremen to sign it or immediately to leave the island. That find- 

 ing themselves unable to leave then, because they had no vessel that 

 could carry him and some thirty laborers, citizens of the United States, 

 he saw himself compelled to sign the document, not thinking that, the 

 circumstances considered, it could be of any valre except so far as it 

 put them beyond the reach of outrage for the time. That a few days 

 after he found an opportunity to proceed to the United States, and he 

 did so to give an account of the occurrences to those who had employed 

 him, Messrs. Lang & Delano, of the city of Boston." 



He is the only deponent who expresses anything like unwillingness 

 at the time to depart from the island, or who asserts that Dias made 

 ostentation of his force, as, for instance, putting his soldiers through 

 their maneuvers, &c., a false assertion, because, as has already been 

 stated, the soldiers had not yet left the vessel for shore. He does not 

 even hint that he was deceived as to the contents of the document, or- 

 that he was utterly unacquainted with the Spanish language ; much 

 less does he hint that violence was offered to him, or that he was put 

 in bodily fear. The reason for his conduct was the want of vessels to 



