ARGUMENT OF SIR WILLIAM ROBSON. 1817 



to deal with began to happen, and they did not have many treaties; 

 their fighting was pretty continuous. 



But, as early as 1686 they felt it necessary to deal with the ques- 

 tion of their jurisdiction. It was only as between themselves, but so 

 far as they were concerned they were the whole world in British 

 North America, just as Spain was the whole world further south. 

 Spain asserted rights, and there were really very few to contest them, 

 but Spain ruled almost alone. In British North America, England 

 and France divided dominion, and their influence there with regard 

 to territoriality of bays was really the only influence to be considered. 

 There was no other. They had never heard or thought in those times 

 of 3-mile lines or 6-mile bays, and they sat down in 1686 to make the 

 treaty which appears on p. 6 of the British Case Appendix. 



And this treaty, though it is dated 1686, is used as a model five 

 years before the treaty of 1783, because in 1778 this very treaty was 

 almost copied by France and the United States : It begins : 



" The subjects, inhabitants, merchants, commanders of ships, mas- 

 ters and mariners, of the kingdoms, provinces and dominions of each 

 King respectively, shall abstain and forbear to trade and fish in all 

 the places possessed or which shall be possessed by one or the other 

 party in America, viz. the King of Great Britain's subjects shall not 

 drive their commerce and trade, nor fish in the havens, bays, creeks, 

 roads, shoals or places, which the Most Christian King holds or shall 

 hereafter hold in America; and in like manner, the Most Christian 

 King's subjects shall not drive their commerce and trade, nor fish in 

 the havens, bays, creeks, roads, shoals or places, which the King of 

 Great Britain possesses or shall hereafter possess in America. And 

 if any ship or vessel shall be found trading or fishing contrary to the 

 tenor of this Treaty, the said ship or vessel, with its lading, proof 

 being made thereof, shall be confiscated ; nevertheless, the party who 

 shall find himself aggrieved by such sentence or confiscation, shall 

 have liberty to apply himself to the Privy Council of that King," 



Now, there are the two Powers concerned sitting down and saying, 

 so far as we are concerned, we will each of us treat our bays as terri- 

 torial. No question there, again, about one kind of bay being terri- 

 torial, and another not, because at this very time they were making 

 claims to the maritime jurisdiction, and a hundred years later claims 

 to maritime jurisdiction, which came 90 miles out from shore. So 

 of course it was a very easy thing to claim the bays. But there, afc 

 the beginning of the history in British North America, at the begin- 

 ning, I was going to say, of its civilised history, I mean the history 

 which records the quarrels of civilised nations however, at the 

 beginning of the history of British North America, you have, then, 

 two nations sitting down and saying we are the only people concerned 

 in this territory, and we will agree with each other to treat our bays 

 as part of our territory, and neither party shall trade in them or fish 

 in them. That is another way of saying they shall not enter them. 

 9 2909_S. Doc. 870, 61-3, vol 11 16 



