446 AVES ISLAND. 



Mr. Cass to Mr. Turpin. 



No. 7.] Department of State, 



Washington, September 15, 1858. 



Sir : I inclose the copy of a letter addressed to the department on tlie 

 8th instant by Henry S. Sanford, Esq., in relation to the Aves Island 

 claim. Mr. Sanford has presentecl, with much force, considerations 

 which should induce Venezuela to accept the basis of compromise offered 

 by the claimants without further discussion or delay, and he has justly 

 referred to the earnest wishes of this department that such an arrange- 

 ment might be made among the claimants as would reduce the amount 

 of the reclamation to the lowest sum consistent with the simple indem- 

 nification of absolute losses. This government is not insensible to the 

 difficulties of a foreign and domestic nature with which Venezuela has 

 been and is still entangled ; and while it has forborne a resort to per- 

 emptory measures of redress, it has, on the other hand, represented to 

 the claimants the propriety of large sacrifices, in order to avoid even 

 the appearance of a want of sympathy for the embarrassed condition 

 of the republic. They have deferred to this view, and have proposed 

 a minimum, which Venezuela, weighing all the circumstances of the 

 case, should cheerfully accept. You will accordingly, in pressing the 

 claim, signify to the Venezuelan government the anticipations which 

 we cherish that the adoption of this compromise will speedily remove 

 any occasion of further dispute or embarrassment in the relations of 

 the two countries. 



I am, sir, your obedient servant, 



LEWIS CASS. 



Edward A. Turpin, Esq., dc. 



Mr. Appleton to Mr. Sanford. 



Department of State, 

 Washington, September 27^ 1858. 



Sir: Although, as you are aware, the department has notified Mr. 

 Turpin of the compromise which has been effected among the several 

 claimants against Venezuela in the Aves Island case, and has instructed 

 him to press an early adjustment of the claim upon the terms indicated 

 in your letters of the 2d and 8th instant, it is deemed proper to apprise 

 you, as the legal attorney of Messrs. Lang & Delano*, that in the con- 

 tingency of the rejection by Venezuela of the arrangement you have 

 proposed, there is no such proof in the department of the actual losses 

 sustained by your principals as would enable it properly to present 

 their claim to the consideration of the government of Venezuela. 



The papers you have filed in support of the claim of Mr. Shelton 

 and others, the benefit of which by virtue of your agreement with the 

 other parties they are permitted to enjoy, substantiate the preliminary 

 facts of discovery, occupation, and eviction, but do not prove the items 

 of actual loss alleged by Lang & Delano. Should your offer of a settle- 



