342 AVES ISLAND. 



deserves elaboration; but, in this instance, I am a mere historian. 

 (Merlin's Repertory of Jurisprudence — ad verbum, occupation.) 



Mr, Eames denies having said that ''the United States in no way- 

 doubt as to the eminent domain of Venezuela over the ' Aves,' and that 

 they merely contest the peculiar right to the guano found in that 

 place," or, at least, he so modifies those words that they do not say 

 what they really import. Unfortunately there exists no written record 

 of what occurred when Mr. Eames gave assurance of this thing, and 

 that more than once, without any reservations of any kind, unless, 

 indeed, mental ones ; but this, notwithstanding the assertion of the 

 undersigned, will not be called into doubt by any one who will reflect 

 that it tallies with and it is confirmed by the nature of the demand set 

 up against the republic. The United States do not claim the island 

 at her hands as their property ; they do not ask for its evacuation and 

 surrender ; they do not ask what the claimants desired ; but they do 

 ask, solely and exclusively, for pecuniary indemnifications. The par- 

 ties interested in applying to their government baptized the '^Aves" 

 under the name of "Shelton's Island," and proposed to cede it to their 

 government, an offer which does not appear to have met with an ac- 

 ceptance. It is also known that the question has been debated in the 

 United States as to whether the right of acquisition lay with the Con- 

 gress of the Republic or with the executive power ; and that an act has 

 been deemed necessary declaring that the islands that might hereafter 

 be discovered, as "Aves" is pretended to* have been, shall belong to- 

 the United States. 



Mr. Eames endeavors to overthrow the reasons deduced from the 

 assistance which he lent to Mr. Pickrell, supposing that nothing can 

 be inferred from it against the present claim. 



Although this has already been amply spoken of in the beginning, 

 it may not be irrelevant to take the American note in con.-^ideration. 

 It begins, on this point, by saying that Mr. Eames' intervention was 

 directed to protect the rights and interests which the Wallace contract 

 secured as to the guano islands considered as justly belonging to Vene- 

 zuela, and, of course, in contradistinction with the " Aves," v/iiich was 

 not so considered. If such were Mr. Eames' instructions, he certainly 

 had no heed of them when he was protecting Pickrell. A copy has 

 already been given of what he stated to his excellency the President 

 when he came to urge him to reinstate the Wallace contract ; and in 

 that there is certainly not one word which goes to except Aves Island. 

 At no time, more opportune, could it have been proper to state such a 

 reservation. Especially ought he to have proceeded with due frank- 

 ness and sincerity, when his excellency remarked to Mr. Eames that 

 it might be more apposite to settle the matter of the claimants before 

 Mr. Pickrell's, pointing out to him at the same time that there was no 

 connection between the two things, because the "Aves" were excepted 

 in the contract. But to induce the government, even by resort to 

 threats, to agree with Pickrell on conditions almost identical with those 

 agreed to with Wallace, to begin to insinuate, after the execution of 

 the new contract, and that in a manner indirect and circumlocutory, 

 that the insertion of Aves Island in it was made without any kind of 

 sanction or of support on the part of the government of the United 



