



THE MONROE DOCTRINE 415 



Her Minister in Washington constantly reminded Mr. Bayard 

 of the Monroe Doctrine. " The violation of the territory 

 of Venezuela," he urged, " has been gradually accomplished 

 by means and under pretences which, in view of the ante- > 

 cedents of the case, appear scarcely credible. The repre- y 

 sentative of Great Britain at Caracas formally declared, in 

 1850, that the acquisition which has now been so tenaciously 

 insisted upon, was not even thought of. By this acquisition, 

 Great Britain gains possession of territories which she did 

 not formerly pretend to claim, and violates the stipulations 

 made with Venezuela in the convention signed at that time 

 through reliance on the sincerity of those declarations." 



Great Britain declined to accept the friendly offices of the 

 United States, and the British Minister at Caracas secured 

 his passport preparatory to abandoning his diplomatic post. ^ 

 English men-of-war appeared in the Orinoco and at La Guira> 

 and for the moment war seemed inevitable. Just at 

 this anxious moment of suspense the unfortunate bound- 

 ary dispute was more than ever complicated by the dis- 

 covery of gold in the interior district of Caratal, a region 

 claimed by Venezuela, and now suddenly occupied by British 

 miners, who, with the usual independence of gold miners, 

 refused to recognize any sovereignty but their own. The 

 matter was still further aggravated by the firmer attitude 

 assumed toward Great Britain in Washington. Mr. Bayard 

 wrote to Mr. Phelps, February 17, 1888 : " The Government 

 of the United States has hitherto taken an earnest and 

 friendly interest in the question of boundaries so long in 

 dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela, and, so far 

 as its disinterested counsels were admissible, has advocated 

 an amicable, final, and honorable settlement of the dispute. 

 We have followed this course on the assumption that the 

 issue was one of historical fact, eminently adaptable for*admit~ 

 ting arbitration, and that the territorial claims of each party 

 had a fixed limit, the right to which would without difficulty 

 be determined according to the evidence. The claim now 

 stated to have been put forth by the authorities of British 

 Guiana necessarily gives rise to grave disquietude, and creates. 



