DESPATCHES, REPORTS, CORRESPONDENCE, ETC. 133 



upon no principle of reciprocity or adequate compensation whatever. 

 It has not been thought necessary to furnish me with additional 

 argument upon this point. I therefore confine myself, upon the 

 present occasion, to a brief repetition of what I have already, at dif- 

 ferent periods, had the honour to submit to your consideration upon 

 the subject of an arrangement by which it is hoped practically to 

 reconcile the different views of our respective Governments. 



It will be in your recollection that, early in the month of July last, 

 I had the honour to acquaint you that I had received instructions 

 from rny Government to assure you that, although it had been felt 

 necessary to resist the claim which had been advanced by Mr. Adams, 

 the determination had not been taken in any unfriendly feeling 

 towards America, or with any illiberal wish to deprive her subjects 

 of adequate means of engaging in the fisheries; but that, on the 

 contrary, many of the considerations which had been urged by Mr. 

 Adams, on behalf of the American citizens formerly engaged in this 

 occupation, had operated so forcibly in favour of granting to them 

 such a concession as might be consistent with the just rights and 

 interests of Great Britain, that I had been furnished with lull pow- 

 ers from His Royal Highness the Prince Regent to conclude an 

 arrangement upon the subject, which it was hoped might at once 

 offer to the United States a pledge of His Royal Highness's goodwill, 

 and afford to them a reasonable participation of those benefits of 

 which they had formerly the enjoyment. 



It being the object of the American Government, that, in addition 

 to the right of fishery, as declared by the first branch of the fourth 

 article of the treaty of 1783 permanently to belong to the citizens 

 of the United States, they should also enjoy the privilege of having 

 an adequate accommodation, both in point of harbours and drying 

 ground, on the unsettled coasts within the British sovereignty. I 

 had the honour to propose to you that that part of the southern 

 coast of Labrador which extends from Mount Joli, opposite the 

 eastern end of the Island of Anticosti, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 

 to the bay and isles Esquimaux, near the western entrance of the 

 Straits of Belleisle, should be allotted for this purpose; it being dis- 

 tinctly agreed that the fishermen should confine themselves to the 

 unsettled parts of the coast, and that all pretensions to fish or dry 

 within the maritime limits, or on any other of the coasts of British 

 North America, should be abandoned. 



Upon learning from you, some weeks afterwards, that, from the 

 information which you had received upon the subject of this coast, 

 you were apprehensive that it would not afford, in a sufficient degree, 

 the advantages required, I did not delay to acquaint you that I was 

 authorised to offer another portion of coast, which it was certainly 

 not so convenient to the British Government to assign, but which 

 they would nevertheless be willing to assign, and which, from its 

 natural and local advantages, could not fail to afford every accom- 

 modation of which the American fishermen could stand in need. I 

 had then the honour to propose to you as an alternative, that, under 

 similar conditions, they should be admitted to that portion of the 

 southern coast of Newfoundland which extends from Cape Ray 

 eastward to the Ramea Islands, or to about the longitude of 57 west 

 of Greenwich. 



