APPENDICES TO ORAL ARGUMENTS. 2243 



ceive such a communication for the purpose of simply transmitting 

 it to your court. 



Upon the subject of the Indians, you will represent that an ade- 

 quate arrangement of their interests is considered by your Govern- 

 ment as a sine qua non of peace ; and that they will, under this head, 

 require not only that a full and express recognition of their limits 

 shall take place; you will also throw out the importance of the two 

 States entering into arrangements, which may hereafter place their 

 mutual relations with each other as well as with the several Indian 

 nations, upon a footing of less jealousy and irritation. This may be 

 best effected by a mutual guarantee of the Indian possessions, as they 

 shall be established upon the peace against encroachment on the 

 part of either State. Much of the disquietude to both Governments, 

 as connected with Indian affairs, has been produced by that regular 

 and progressive system of encroachment which renders the Indians 

 resentful and discontented, and which, by gradually approximating 

 the American and British settlements, gives both States a motive 

 for interference in Indian affairs which would not otherwise exist. 

 The best prospect of future peace appears to be that the two Gov- 

 ernments should regard the Indian territory as a useful barrier be- 

 tween both States, to prevent collision ; and that, having agreed mu- 

 tually to respect the integrity of their territory, they have a common 

 interest to render these people as far as possible peaceful neighbours 

 to both States. 



You may open to the American Commission that the British 

 Government is desirous of revising the frontier between the two 

 States, not in the spirit of conquest or dominion, but upon principles 

 which they consider to be strictly defensive, and, in this point of 

 view, conducive to the well-understood interests of both Powers. It 

 has become the more necessary to reconsider the treaty of 1783, which 

 was very hastily and improvidently framed in this respect, from the 

 intention so publicly and recently avowed in the Acts and .proclama- 

 tions issued by the American Government of annexing by conquest 

 the Canadas to their dominions. This plan becomes the more alarm- 

 ing, as a part only of a more general system of aggrandisement, in 

 the execution of which they have possessed themselves of Louisiana 

 and a part of both the Floridas in the midst of peace, and whilst 

 Spain was bravely contending for her existence. 



But the point, upon which you must be quite explicit from the 

 outset of the negotiation, is the construction of the treaty of 1783 

 with relation to the fisheries. You will observe that the third 

 article of that treaty consists of two distinct branches: The first, 

 which relates to the open sea fishery, we consider a permanent obliga- 

 tion, being a recognition of the general right which all nations have 

 to frequent and take fish in the high seas. 



The latter branch is, on the contrary, considered as a mere con- 

 ventional arrangement between the two States, and, as such, to have 

 been annulled by the war. This part of the treaty has been found 

 to be productive of so much inconvenience, as to determine His 

 Majesty's Government not to renew the provisions of it in their 

 present form; nor do they feel themselves called upon to concede 

 to the Americans any accommodation within the British sovereignty, 

 except upon the principle of a reasonable equivalent in frontier or 



