340 MISCELLANEOUS 



No. XV. 



Despatch from Secretary Lyttelton to Governor Boyle explaining 

 the advantages of the new treaty. 



[Copy.] 



DOWNING STREET, April 18th, 1904. 

 Newfoundland, No. 9.] 



SIB, In confirmation of my telegram to-day, I have the honour to 

 forward to you, for the information of your Ministers, copies of a 

 paper which has been laid before Parliament containing the texts of 

 the Agreements concluded with France on the 8th instant, together 

 with an explanatory Despatch by the Secretary of State for Foreign 

 Affairs. 



2. The general effect of the Convention dealing with Newfound- 

 land is that France renounces, in return for important territorial 

 concessions in other parts of the Empire and in consideration of the 

 grant of a pecuniary compensation to the French citizens engaged 

 in fishing or the preparation of fish on the Treaty Shore, the privi- 

 leges established to her advantage by Article XIII. of the Treaty of 

 Utrecht and confirmed or modified by subsequent provisions, with- 

 draws her claim to the right of fishing in the rivers of the Colony 

 and retains only the right of fishing on equal terms with British 

 Fishermen in the waters of the Treaty Coast during the usual sum- 

 mer fishery season subject to the local Regulations or Laws relating 

 to the establishment of a close time or to the improvement of the 

 fisheries. 



3. As a supplement to the Convention, notes have been exchanged 

 between the two Governments providing for the reciprocal recogni- 

 tion, on the Convention coming into force, of a British Consul at St. 

 Pierre and a French Consul at St. John's. 



4. Notes have been exchanged respecting the signification attached 

 by His Majesty's Government to the words " stake nets or fixed en- 

 gines " which occur in paragraph 3 of Article II., and respecting 

 the effect of the permission accorded to French citizens in paragraph 

 2 of the same Article to enter ports and harbours on the Treaty Coast 

 and there obtain supplies or bait or shelter on the same conditions 

 as the inhabitants of Newfoundland. 



5. Copies of these various notes are enclosed for the information 

 of your Ministers. 



6. Permanent legislation by the Colony will be required for the 

 carrying out of Regulations to be drawn up under the Convention for 

 the policing of the joint fishery, etc., but your Ministers will be con- 

 sulted and have full opportunity by expressing their views on the 

 terms of any such Regulations before they are agreed to by His 

 Majesty's Government. 



7. It is with much satisfaction that I find myself able, in the name 

 of His Majesty's Government, to congratulate the Government and 

 the people of Newfoundland on the signature of a Convention which 

 puts an end to a situation on the Treaty Shore which for nearly two 

 hundred years has given rise to difficulties and anxieties of the most 

 serious character. The advantage to Newfoundland of becoming 

 the mistress of the whole of her coasts and of being free to devote 



