ARGUMENT OF SIR WILLIAM ROBSON. 1811 



tions in my coast which would put my land under your power, even 

 though you still remained on the water and more than 3 miles away 

 from the land." That is the reason why bays are separately treated. 

 " I do not like," says not only England, but every other nation that 

 has a bay, " to have your ships of war or any other ships coming into 

 a position in which you get a great strategic advantage against me. 

 As long as I have got you well out in front of me, 3 miles beyond my 

 coast, then I know where you are; but when I have you creeping 

 under my headlands, you get two advantages: you get one supreme 

 advantage first of all a position of shelter, in which you may await 

 political events." Imagine a possibility of an outbreak of war. One 

 nation desires to make a naval demonstration a most mischievous 

 kind of international amusement. It wants to make a naval demon- 

 stration, which, of course, is a thing that may be followed, and very 

 often is followed, by a war. It is a very unpleasant thing to go and 

 lie up 3 miles off a coast for great ships of war or any other ships. 

 But what pleasure to be able to put your ships in a sheltered bay ! 

 Three miles off the coast of a bay is a very different thing to 3 miles 

 off an open coast. In an open coast you have full sweep of the 

 greatest storms. 



DR. DE SAVORXIN LOHMAN: If you will permit me, Sir Wil- 

 liam: I have not spoken, in the questions that I put, of the juris- 

 diction in general. I have confined my questions to documents in 

 effect in reference to the fishing rights of the United States not in 



general. 



1095 SIR W. ROBSON: I am much obliged, Sir. I quite appre- 

 ciate that. Your question did relate to fishing rights, and, 

 perhaps, I have not made myself quite clear. I was only dealing 

 there with the wider question in order to explain how it is that the 

 parties came to distinguish between " bay " and " coast," that is all. 

 But so far as fishing rights are concerned, up to 1812 there had been 

 no dispute, because they had enjoyed them under the treaty of 1783. 

 They enjoyed them from 1783 to 1812 in peace; and then from 1812, 

 of course, there was war, and they were not allowed to. come back 

 when peace was made in 1814. They were not allowed to come back. 

 That is very material. They were all kept out of bays and everything 

 else. Then, of course, came the treaty of 1818. 



So that, as far as fishing was concerned, there had not been much 

 opportunity for dispute. 



But, on the other question that Dr. Lohman is good enough to put 

 to me: "Were bays treated as a component part of a coast, or as 

 something different from the coast in general ? " I wish to say they 

 were not treated as something different from the coast in the sense 

 that they did not form part of what is known as " coast." You can 

 use the word " coast " in a sense wide enough to cover every bay and 



