410 AVES ISLAND. 



she conceded. [Mr. Eames seems to forget the pretensions of Holland, 

 of which he speaks in this same note.] I added * * * He rejoined 

 * * * I said^ as we parted, that I very much regretted to find so 

 wide a diiference of opinion between us upon a matter which, as it 

 stood before me^, appeared so serioias. But I felt, as I left him, well 

 assured that, anticipating a discussion in writing, he considered he had 

 an impregnable case against the claim, and was reserving his fire. 



''Soon afterwards, and while I was still seeking to ascertain the 

 exact nature of admissions which I should have to encounter in prose- 

 cuting the reclamations of the claimants, there was put into my hand 

 by a merchant here a paper which purported to be a copy of an agree- 

 ment entered into and signed at the Island of Aves, &c," 



After the month of April, 1855, up to September of the same year, 

 Mr. Eames made no exertion whatever, either verbally or in writing, 

 about the claim now before the government of Venezuela, as shown by 

 the following paragraph extracted from the aforesaid note which Mr. 

 Eames addressed to Senor Gutierrez, March 31, 1857. 



''These two notes of the 24th of Se]3tember, 1855, (memorandum,) 

 and of the 8th of March, 1855, (in opposition to the claim of Holland,) 

 were repeatedly referred to by the undersigned in his note of the 20th 

 of December last, and such having been from the first, and up to the 

 present time, the recorded and steadily maintained position of the un- 

 dersigned and of the government of the United States as to the rights 

 and claims of the present claimants, &c." 



It follows, therefore, that during the first seven months elapsed after 

 the armed occupation of Isla de Aves by Venezuela, Mr. Eames, having 

 in view the introduction of the Shelton claim, made no kind of reserva- 

 tion, either verbally or in writing, concerning the Wallace contract. 



In September, 1855, arose the claim of Pickrell, the agent for the 

 Wallace assignees. It is now incumbent on the government of Vene- 

 zuela to show that — 



Ji@^ The American minister on the occasion referred to, did not, as 

 he has since alleged, except Isla de Aves from the claim which he in- 

 dorsed, and therefore did acknowledge the sovereignty of Venezuela 

 over said island. 



Mr. Eames has attempted to prove the express exception by the fol- 

 lowing words of his memorandum, dated September 24, 1855: 



"After this preliminary reference^ and having previously presented 

 to his excellency the agent of the company, the undersigned proceeded 

 officially to make known to his excellency what he had previously de- 

 clared to the minister of his excellency's government, that in rendering 

 his good offices in aid of the purposes of the agent of the company to 

 secure their rights as the assignees of the Wallace contract, "the under- 

 signed was emphatically instructed to forbear from saying or doing 

 anything which could in the slightest degree affect or impair the claim 

 against the Venezuelan government for full reparation on the part of 

 those American citizens whom Venezuela had found in the possession 

 of the Aves Island in December last. The undersigned explained, 

 therefore, fully and clearly to his excellency that all which he might 

 say or do in aid of the agent of the company must be understood with 

 this express reservation: That the Aves claim was a wholly separate 



