DESPATCHES, REPORTS, CORRESPONDENCE, ETC. 729 



named parts of the coasts of British North America, and its islands, 

 and in their bays, harbours, and creeks, etc. It also provided for a 

 renunciation by the United States of pre-existing rights to take 

 fish, etc., " within 3 marine miles of any of the coasts, bays, creeks, or 

 harbours " of His Majesty's dominions in British North America, 

 not included within the previously-mentioned limits, but with a pro- 

 viso, as a reservation upon the renunciation of the right to fish, that 

 the 



American fishermen shall be admitted to enter such bays or harbours for the 

 purposes of shelter and of repairing damages therein, of purchasing wood, and 

 of obtaining water, and for no other purposes whatever. But they shall be 

 under such restrictions as may be necessary to prevent their taking, drying, 

 or curing fish therein, or in any other manner whatever abusing the privileges 

 hereby reserved to them. 



It will be observed that the ancient right continued in all its force 

 in every bay, harbour, and creek of a described territory, and that 

 the renunciation of the right to fish on other coasts, bays, harbours, 

 and creeks is in the same language, and is perfectly correlative to the 

 first, and that the line of British municipal dominion was recognised 

 and stated to be a line 3 marine miles from these British coasts, bays, 

 creeks, and harbours, and that this renunciation was, both in 

 437 substance and form, a renunciation only of a right to -fish 

 and to exercise the incidents of the fishing, as drying, etc., and 

 that the proviso to that renunciation admitted the American fisher- 

 men to enter such waters, bays, and harbours for the specific purposes 

 necessary to them in their character as fishermen only, and not hav- 

 ing the slightest reference, either expressly or by implication, to 

 any -fishing or other vessel of the United States and sailing under 

 their flag, entering any port of His Majesty's dominions anywhere 

 for any commercial or trading purpose. And these entries into ex- 

 clusively British fishing waters fishing vessels (the only ones entitled 

 to be there at all) were to be under such restrictions, and such only, 

 as should be necessary to prevent their exercising the fishing rights 

 that had been renounced and abusing the privileges of such entry 

 so reserved; that is, by doing the renounced thing, viz, the taking 

 and curing of fish, or violating the British laws excluding all Ameri- 

 can trading vessels. 



It is to be kept clearly in view that at the time of the conclusion 

 of this treaty of 1818, and for twelve years afterward, no American 

 vessel had any right to enter any port of British North America, 

 with the few exceptions named in the mutual arrangements of 1820 

 and 1823, hereinafter stated. The treaty of 1815 and the British 

 laws and policy reserved the whole trade and intercourse with the 

 ports of these colonies to her own vessels, and, reciprocally, there wa 

 no law or treaty of the United States which authorised the entry 

 into ports (with the exceptions stated) of the United States of 

 British vessels from British North American ports. 



Thus it was that the treaty of 1818 omitted to make any mention 

 of the ports in the British provinces in connection with the arrival 

 or departure of American vessels, either fishing or other, and so it 

 was a clear and necessary construction of the treaty of 1818 that the 

 arrangements, conditions, and renunciations therein provided had no 

 relation, one way or the other, to the exercise of what may be called 

 commercial rights by the American fishing or other vessels in the 



