ALABAMA CLAIMS. 77 



cupled by the Society for the Succor of the Wounded : 

 a room of moderate dimensious, but adequate to the 

 purpose, fitted up with elegance and good taste, not, 

 however, specially for the Commission or Tribunal, 

 but for ordinary uses of the City or Canton, indicated 

 by its title " Salle des Conferences." 



The Hotel de Ville is a structure in the Florentine 

 style of architecture, situated on the summit of the 

 old Gemeva, and which is occupied both by munic- 

 ipal officers of the City and by the executive and leg- 

 islative authorities of the Canton. 



COUNT FREDERIC SCLOPIS. 



Here, then, in the "Salle des Conferences" of the 

 Hotel de Ville, at Geneva, the Tribunal assembled to 

 listen to the opening discourse of the President, Count 

 Sclopis, and to take up the business remaining for the 

 consideration of the Arbitrators. 



Count Sclopis, in this discourse, expressed belief 

 that the meeting of the Tribunal indicated of itself 

 the impression of new direction on the public policy 

 of nations the most advanced in civilization, and the 

 commencement of an epoch in Avhich the spirit of 

 moderation and the sentiment of equity were begin- 

 ning to prevail over the tendency of the old routines 

 of arbitrary violence or culpable indifference. He 

 signified regret that the pacific views of the Congress 

 of Paris had not been seconded by events in Europe. 

 He congratulated the world that the statesmen who 

 directed the destinies of Great Britain and the United 

 States, with rare firmness of conviction and devotion 



