842 CORRESPONDENCE, ETC. 



The minister has every reason to believe the statements made by 

 the subcollector at Canso, and, taking into consideration all the cir- 

 cumstances of the case, is of the opinion that the information which 

 has reached the Secretary of State does not rest upon a trustworthy 

 basis. 



With reference to the concluding portion of Mr. Bayard's note, 

 the minister observes that the occasion of the present dispatch, which 

 has to deal mainly with questions of fact, does not render it necessary 

 for him to enter upon any lengthened discussion of the question of 

 headland limits. 



Mr. Bayard to Sir L. West. 



DEPARTMENT or STATE, 

 "Washington, October 19, 1886. 



SIR: The Everett Steele, a fishing vessel of Gloucester, Mass., in the 

 United States, of which Charles E. Forbes, an American citizen, was 

 master, was about to enter, on the 10th of September, 1886, the harbor 

 of Shelburne, Nova Scotia, to procure water and for shelter during 

 repairs. She was hailed, when entering the harbor, by the Canadian 

 cutter Terror, by whose captain, Quigley, her papers were taken and 

 retained. Captain Forbes, on arriving off the town, anchored and 

 went with Captain Quigley to the custom-house, who asked him 

 whether he reported whenever he had come in. Captain Forbes 

 answered that he had reported always, with the exception of a visit 

 on the 25th of March, when he was driven into the lower harbor for 

 shelter by a storm and where he remained only eight hours. The col- 

 lector did not consider that this made the vessel liable, but Captain 

 Quigley refused to discharge her; said he would keep her until he 

 heard from Ottawa, put her in charge of policemen, and detained her 

 until the next day, when at noon she was discharged by the collector ; 

 but a calm having come on she could not get to sea, and by the delay 

 her bait was spoiled and the expected profits of her trip lost. 



It is scarcely necessary for me to remind you, in presenting this case 

 to the consideration of your government, that when the northeastern 

 coast of America was wrested from France in a large measure by the 

 valor and enterprise of New England fishermen, they enjoyed, in com- 

 mon with other British subjects, the control of the fisheries with which 

 that coast was enriched, and that by the treaty of peace of 1783, which, 

 as was said by an eminent English judge when treating an analo- 

 gous question, was a treaty of " separation," this right was expressly 

 affirmed. 



It is true that by the treaty of 1818, the United States renounced a 

 portion of its rights in these fisheries, retaining, however, the old pre- 

 rogatives of visiting the bays and harbors of the British northeastern 

 possessions for the purpose of obtaining wood, water, and shelter, and 

 for objects incidental to those other rights of territorially so retained 

 and confirmed. What is the nature of these incidental prerogatives, it 

 is not, in considering this case, necessary to discuss. It is enough to 

 say that Captain Forbes entered the harbor of Shelburne to obtain 

 shelter and water, and that he had as much right to be there under the 

 treaty of 1818, confirming in this respect the ancient privileges of 

 American fishermen on those coasts, as he would have had on the high 



