948 NORTH ATLANTIC COAST FISHERIES ARBITRATION. 



This statement is a good deal, if I may so term it, mixed up; but 

 the point to which I wish to call attention is this : That this territory 

 from Cape LaHune to the eastward, within about 30 miles of the 

 Rameau Island, includes of course waters over which the Americans 

 had no right, and at the time of the passing of these regulations the 

 Americans were not fishing, as I have stated, with seines at all, and 

 this was purely a fishery regulation, intended to protect that part of 

 the coast from seining, because on that part of the coast, from Cape 

 LaHune right around, the herring were found to be not in sufficient 

 abundance to withstand seining. The herring were more abundant 

 in other parts of the coast farther to the eastward, in Fortune Bay. 

 The great fishing ground for herring is in Fortune Bay, and it was 

 found necessary and useful to prohibit seining altogether from Cape 

 LaHune right round to the west, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and 

 right north to Cape John. And, further than that, to show that it 

 was not intended against the Americans, the prohibition is right 

 through the Straits of Belle Isle to Cape John, a long distance on 

 the north-east coast of the island, where the Americans have no right 

 of fishing, and where it could not have been directed against them. 



This examination of this legislation, Mr. President, I consider 

 necessary in order to satisfy the Tribunal, as far as I can, that not 

 one of these acts or regulations was designed to injuriously affect in 

 any way whatever the rights and privileges of the Americans under 

 the treaty of 1818. In so far as the fishery was concerned, the fishery 

 regulations applied to the people of both countries, both when the 

 Americans were fishing under the treaties of 1854 and 1871 and also 

 when they had not those rights. They were aimed at our own people 

 principally, because the prohibition against any appliance, no matter 

 what it is seines, cod-traps, bultows, or anything else applies to 

 ten Newfoundland fishermen as against one United States fisherman 

 to whom it can apply at all. The only fishery I cannot help repeat- 

 ing it too often, because it is important to this case the only fishery 

 that can be called a fishery, that was carried on by the fishermen of the 

 United States in Newfoundland waters down to 1905 and down to the 

 present day, was the cod fishery, and that out in the deep waters, not 

 even near the coast of Newfoundland. They only came into the ports, 

 bays, harbours, and creeks for the purpose of getting bait, and 

 568 when they came in for the purpose of getting bait they invari- 

 ably purchased it and never fished for it. None of these 

 minor fishery regulations that are on the Newfoundland statute book, 

 numerous as they are, as the Court will see, was intended to have any 

 relation to or effect upon American fishermen, nor as a matter of fact 

 has it had. The Americans have taken no notice whatever of them, 

 and we have heard nothing about them until the present moment in 

 this case. The whole object of these rules and regulations was the 



