DESPATCHES, REPORTS, CORRESPONDENCE, ETC. 161 



press the article in such manner as would not render the right liable 

 to be thus abrogated. The words " for ever " were inserted for that 

 purpose, and we also made the declaration annexed to the protocol 

 of the third conference, the principal object of which was to provide 

 in any event for the revival of all our prior rights. The insertion of 

 the words " for ever " was strenuously resisted. The British pleni- 

 potentiaries urged that, in case of war, the only effect of those words 

 being omitted, or of the article being considered as abrogated, would 

 be the necessity of inserting in the treaty of peace a new article re- 

 newing the present one ; and that, after all that had passed, it would 

 certainly be deemed expedient to do it, in whatever manner the con- 

 dition was now expressed. We declared that we would not agree to 

 any article on the subject, unless the words were preserved, or in case 

 they should enter on the protocol a declaration impairing their effect. 

 It will also be perceived that we insisted on the clause by which the 

 United States renounce their right to the fisheries relinquished by the 

 convention, that clause having been omitted in the first British counter- 

 projet. We insisted on it with the view 1st. Of preventing any 

 implication that the fisheries secured to us were a new grant, and of 

 placing the permanence of the rights secured and of those renounced 

 precisely on the same footing. 2d. Of its being expressly stated that 

 our renunciation extended only to the distance of three miles from 

 the coasts. This last point was the more important, as, with the 

 exception of the fishery in open boats within certain harbours, it ap- 

 peared, from the communications above mentioned, that the fishing- 

 f round, on the whole coast of Nova Scotia, is more than three miles 

 rom the shores ; whilst, on the contrary, it is almost universally close 

 to the shore on the coasts of Labrador. It is in that point of view 

 that the privilege of entering the ports for shelter is useful, and it is 

 hoped that, with that provision, a considerable portion of the actual 

 fisheries on that coast (of Nova Scotia) will, notwithstanding the re- 

 nunciation, be preserved. 



2. Boundary line. 



This being definitively fixed at the forty-ninth degree of north lati- 

 tude, from the Lake of the Woods to the Stony Mountains, it is un- 

 necessary to repeat the arguments which were urged on that subject. 

 The attempt was again made to connect with it an article, securing 

 to the British access to the Mississippi, and the right to its naviga- 

 tion. We declared, and entered the declaration in the protocol, that 

 we could not agree to the article, nor to any that would bring the 

 British in contact with that river. The British plenipotentiaries hav- 

 ing, by the protocol of the seventh conference, agreed to the 

 95 omission of the article, that point is also definitely settled. 

 And it may be observed, with reference to the treaty of 1783, 

 that, if the United States have not secured to themselves the whole 

 of the fisheries heretofore enjoyed within the jurisdiction of Great 

 Britain, they have obtained the liberty of curing fish on a part of 

 the southern coast of Newfoundland, and the abandonment of an 

 inconvenient privilege within their own territory. 



92901)" S. Doc. 870, 01-3, vol 4 21 



