30 
for transmission to the Imperial Government. In either case, 
the process of “ circumlocution” through which the complaint 
or application has to pass before it ‘is finally disposed of, and 
the delays and difficulties to which it will be subject in its 
course, are, in nine cases out of ten, of themselves alone sufficient 
to make the attempt a hopeless one from the outset. If the 
application is made to the officer in command of one of the ships 
on the protection duty, the particulars of the case must be reported 
to the senior officer on the station, by him to the Admiral, by the 
Admiral to the Admiralty, by the Admiralty to the Foreign Office, 
by the Foreign Office to the British Minister at Paris, with 
instructions to submit the matter or present the claim to the 
French Government. How many stages it may have to pass 
through in France before a reply is sent to the British Minister 
we do not pretend to guess, but it will probably have to be 
referred through the proper department to the senior French 
naval officer on the station for his report. Whether the claim 
be admitted or disputed (we have. never yet heard of one 
having been admitted), the reply will have to come back to 
the complainant through the same route as that by which it 
went, calling at the same stations on the way. If, there being 
no British naval officer available to the complainant, he has to 
send his case through the Governor, the route will be slightly 
different, but about as long and as circuitous as that by way of 
_ the war-ship and the Admiralty. The Governor will forward the 
case to the Colonial Office, thence it will go to the Foreign Office, 
thence, probably, to the Admiralty to be referred to the naval 
officer on the station to see if he has heard anything about the 
case, and if he has, for his report; thence back to the Foreign 
Office, thence to the British Minister in Paris, and from him to 
the French Government. After the same circuit in France as 
already described, the correspondence will return to England, 
and thence through the same route to the original complainant ; 
the result being almost to a certainty that under the con- 
flict of statement as regards the facts, and owing to the widely- 
divergent views entertained by the Governments of England and 
France respectively as to the rights of the British—or French, 
as it may be—fishermen, in such cases as that now under con- 
sideration—“ Her Majesty’s Government regret that they are 
“unable to obtain from the French authorities a recognition of the 
