PERIOD FROM 1871 TO 1888. 191 



vessel Thomas F. Bayard, that being at Bonne Bay, which is on the 

 western coast of Newfoundland within the limits specified in Article 

 I of the convention referred to, the master of the said vessel was 

 formally notified by one N. N. Taylor, tlie officer of customs at that 

 point, that his vessel would be seized if he attempted to obtain a 

 supply of fish for bait or for any other transaction in connection with 

 fishing operations within three marine miles of that coast. 



To avoid the seizure of his vessel the master broke up his voyage 

 and returned home. 



I am also in possession of the affidavit of Alexander T. Eachern, 

 master of the American fishing schooner Mascot, who entered Port 

 Amlierst, Magdalen Islands, and was there threatened by the customs 

 official with seizure of his vessel if he attempted to obtain bait for 

 fishing or to take a pilot. 



These are flagrant violations of treaty rights of their citizens for 

 which the United States expect prompt remedial action by Her 

 Majesty's Government; and I have to ask that such instructions may 

 be issued forth^^dth to the provincial officials of Newfoundland and 

 of the Magdalen Islands as will cause the treaty rights of citizens of 

 the United States to be duly respected.'^ 



On the same day Mr. Bayard also \vrote to Mr. Phelps, the 

 American ^Minister at London, in regard to the interference with 

 these vessels, instructing him to bring the matter to the attention 

 of the British Government, and in the course of this letter he said: 



Previous attempts or suggestions have been made by the local au- 

 thorities of Newfoundland to inhibit the purchase or sale of fresh fish 

 for use as bait, and the same have been distinctly disapproved by Her 

 Majesty's Government, notably by the Duke of Newcastle, when 

 secretary of state for the colonies, in his dispatch of August 3, 1863, 

 to the governor of Newfoundland, Sir A. Bannerman, a copy of 

 which you will find at page 111 in the public document (Ex. Doc. 

 No. 84, House of Representatives, Forty-sixth Congress, second ses- 

 sion) sent you by this mail.*" 



The letter, referred to by Mr. Bayard, from the Duke of Newcastle 

 to the Governor of Newfoundland was written in response to a 

 request for observations on a proposed biU framed by the New- 

 foundland Government with a view to the regulation of the New- 

 foundland fisheries, in regard to which the Duke of Newcastle 

 expresses himself in that letter as follows : 



The observations which suggest themselves to me, however, on 

 the perusal of the draft bill are — 



1st. That if any misconception exists in Newfoundland respectuig 

 the limits of the colonial jurisdiction, it would be desirable that it 

 should be put at rest by embodying in the act a distinct settlement 



o Appendix, p. 805. b Appendix, p. 806. 



