582 THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEA 



the 51st of northern latitude, and in other parts specified, had 

 been exclusively granted to Russian subjects; and therefore 

 prohibiting "all foreign vessels not only to land on the coasts 

 and islands belonging to Russia, as stated above, but also to 

 approach them within less than 100 Italian miles," the 

 penalty for doing so being the confiscation of the transgressing 

 vessel and the cargo. 1 The Russian Government claimed that 

 the extent of sea of which the Russian possessions formed 

 the limits " comprehended all the conditions which are ordinarily 

 attached to closed seas (mers fermdes), and it might conse- 

 quently judge itself authorised to exercise upon this sea the 

 right of sovereignty, and especially that of entirely inter- 

 dicting the entrance of foreigners; but it preferred only 

 asserting its essential rights without taking any advantage 

 of localities." This, it will be perceived, was a revival in the 

 nineteenth century of pretensions similar to those which 

 Denmark had advanced in the seventeenth and eighteenth ; 

 and the claim was opposed by Great Britain and the United 

 States, whose interests were threatened by it. The British 

 Government declared that it was contrary to the law of 

 nations, and that it could not admit the right of any Power 

 possessing the sovereignty of a country to exclude the vessels 

 of others from the seas on its coasts to a distance of 100 

 Italian miles. In its justification Russia cited, not the Italian 

 publicists or the earlier practice in the Mediterranean, but 

 an article in the treaty of Utrecht, which assigned thirty 

 leagues as the distance of prohibition (see p. 531), an argument 

 which was sufficiently answered by the statement that the 

 distance mentioned was a particular stipulation in a treaty 

 to which the other party had given its deliberate consent. 

 At an early period in the discussion the Russian Government 

 suspended the execution of the ukase, and instructed the 

 commanders of their ships of war to confine their surveillance 

 as nearly as possible "to the mainland, i.e., over an extent 

 of sea within the range of cannon-shot from the shore." 



An article in the draft convention subsequently arranged 

 between Great Britain and Russia provided for an exclusive 

 fishery, not within three miles, but within two leagues or six 



1 Martens, Nouv. Rccuett, V. ii. 358 ; Behring Sea Arbitration, British Case, Part. 

 Papers, United States, No. 1 (1893), p. 38, App. I. No. 1. 



