MODERN PRACTICE 653 



precisely defining on charts the exclusive fishing waters of 

 the two countries in the Little Belt. 1 



Denmark is one of the Scandinavian countries which, as 

 previously mentioned, claimed a wide extent of territorial 

 sea. In 1812 the limits, both for Norway and Denmark, 

 were defined as follows in a royal ordinance : " We will 

 that it be established as a rule in all cases where it is a 

 question of determining the maritime boundary of our terri- 

 tory, that that territory shall be reckoned to the ordinary 

 distance of one marine league from the outermost islands or 

 islets which are not overflowed by the sea." 2 The league 

 in these Scandinavian ordinances, as previously mentioned, 

 is one-fifteenth of a degree, or four geographical miles, and 

 therefore one mile more than the ordinary three-mile limit. 

 But, in point of fact, owing to the method of measurement 

 adopted, the space of sea included as territorial is much 

 greater. Instead of computing the four miles from low- 

 water mark on the shore, which is the base usually taken, 

 it is measured from an imaginary straight line connecting 

 the outermost points of the permanently visible isles or 

 rocks lying farthest from the coast. In some places the 

 extent of water thus cut off as territorial is very consider- 

 able. Though the other Scandinavian countries, Norway and 

 Sweden, have maintained this limit to the present day, it 

 has been in practice abandoned by Denmark, which has 

 adopted the three - mile limit in certain agreements with 

 Germany, in the North Sea Convention of 1882, and in the 

 recent treaty with Great Britain with respect to Iceland 

 and the Faroes. In the Skagerrack and Cattegat she con- 

 cedes the three-mile limit to German and British fishermen, 

 and no doubt also to the fishermen of the other nations which 

 were parties to the North Sea Convention ; and it is of 



1 MittheUungen des deutschen Seejischerei-vereins, Bd. xiii. 61. 189". 



2 " vj v jii e have fastsat som Regel i alle de Tilfaelde hvor Sp<j>rgsmaal er om 

 Bestemmelse af Vor Territorial-Hoiheds Grsondse udi S<j>en, at denne skal regnes 

 indtil den sscdvanlige S(j>-Miils Afstand fra den yderste <^ eller Holme fra Landet, 

 som ikke overskylles af S<|>en." Rescripter Resolutioner, &c., i. 626, 22 (25), Feb. 

 1812. A circular of the Royal Danish Chancellory of 18th August 1810 made an 

 exception for the territorial waters near the fortress of Kronberg, on the Sound, 

 and of Gliickstadt, on the Elbe, where the distance was to be computed only up to 

 the range of the guns of the fortress. Auber, Annuaire de VInstitut de Droit 

 International, xi. 146 (1894). 



