32 READJUSTMENT AFTER WAR 



region of over ten thousand square miles in dis 

 pute on the frontier of Maine and New Bruns 

 wick; and further the discovery was made, much 

 to the discomfort of the Americans, that what 

 had for fifty years passed for the forty-fifth 

 parallel and served as the boundary between 

 New York and Vermont on the one side and 

 Canada on the other, was in fact so far from the 

 true parallel as to leave on British soil a costly 

 fortress under construction by the United States 

 at Rouse s Point. 



The progress of settlement and development 

 made this situation a cause of great concern to 

 the two governments. Arbitration was ar 

 ranged in 1827 and the King of the Netherlands 

 was chosen as umpire. His opinion, pronounced 

 in 1831, frankly declared the impossibility of 

 deciding which, if either, of the conflicting 

 claims conformed to the terms of the treaty of 

 1783, and proposed a line that divided the 

 region in dispute. This proposal was not ac 

 cepted by either government, and the matter 

 remained to be the source of ever-increasing 

 friction, as we shall see, until 1842. 



If the character of their formal diplomatic 

 intercourse were a conclusive criterion of the 

 general feeling of two nations toward each other, 



