QUESTION ONE. 15 



111 regard to the Fishery between the Island of Newfoundland and 

 those of St. Pierre and Miquelon, it is not to be carried on by either 

 Party, but to the middle of the Channel, and His Majesty will give 

 the most positive orders that the French Fishermen shall not go 

 beyond this line. His Majesty is firmly persuaded that the King of 

 Great Britain will give like orders to the English Fishermen. 



In connection with the foregoing fisheries provisions, it should be 

 noted that they were continued and confirmed by Article XIII of 

 the Treaty of May 30, 1814, and Article XI of the Treaty of Novem- 

 ber 20, 1815, between Great Britain and France, which Articles are 

 as follows: 



ARTICLE XIII OF THE TREATY OF MAY 30, 1814. 



The French right of Fishery upon the Great Bank of Newfound- 

 land, upon the Coasts of the Island of that name, and of the adjacent 

 Islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, shall be replaced upon the 

 footing on which it stood in 1792. 6 



ARTICLE XI OF THE TREATY OF NOVEMBER 20, 1815. 



The Treaty of Paris of the 30th of May, 1814, and the final Act of 

 the Congress of Vienna of the 9th of June, 1815, are confirmed, and 

 shall be maintained in all such of their enactments which shall not 

 have been modified by the Articles of the present Treaty. 6 



The correct interpretation of the foregoing treaty provisions was 

 a matter of dispute between Great Britain and France for many 

 years, France contending that the provisions should be interpreted 

 as granting to French fishermen exclusive fishing rights on the 

 coast of Newfoundland within the prescribed limits, which came 

 to be known as the " French Coast," and as preventing the establish- 

 ment of fixed settlements of whatever nature on that portion of the 

 coast. Great Britain on the other hand has always denied that such 

 rights were exclusive, and, although admitting that the French had 

 certain prior rights to the use of the shore during the fishing season, 

 has maintained that the British fishermen had rights in common with 

 the French in the taking of fish in the waters of the French treaty 

 coast. 



The British position with respect to the French rights on the New- 

 foundland coast under these treaties and accompanying declarations 

 is officially stated in the following extract from a note written July 

 10, 1838, by Viscount Palmerston to Count Sebastiani : 



U. S. Case, Appendix, p. 56. U. S. Case, Appendix, p. 1083. 



6 U. S. Case, Appendix, p. 57. 



