QUESTION SIX. 245 



terms admitted that the treaty of 1871 only added " the liberty to 

 take fish of every kind except shell fish " on that portion of the coast 

 of Newfoundland " extending from the Rameau Islands on the south- 

 west coast of the island eastward and northerly to the Quirpon 

 Islands" 



A few other instances of similar admissions and similar construc- 

 tion of the treaty may be cited. 



1852: Mr. Crowdy, writing from the Government House, New- 

 foundland, on September 22, 1852, to Sir John Pakington with refer- 

 ence to the French claim to an exclusive fishery, stated : 



The very terms of the Declaration in question [1783] whilst for- 

 bidding the English fishermen to interrupt by their competition, or 

 to injure the stages, etc., of the French, recognize their presence, and 

 the whole question would appear to be settled by the concession on 

 the part of our Government, to the citizens of the United States in 

 the treaty of 1818 of the same rights which had been conceded to the 

 French in that of 1783. 



1876: In resolutions, adopted by the Executive Council of New- 

 foundland for transmission to the British Government, which are 

 printed in the Journal of the Legislative Assembly of 1876, appears 

 the following: 



That the extent of the coast-line of the so-called French Shore, 

 inclusive of the sinuosities of the Bays and Inlets, is little short of 

 the one-half of the whole sea-coast of the island. Of this great dis- 

 tance the French occupy a small fractional part only; the British 

 are scattered more or less throughout the whole length. 



That the rights of fishing involved in the absurd claims of ail 

 exclusive fishery by the French are not limited to the residents of 

 Newfoundland ; they are the rights of the other provinces of British 

 North America, and also those of the United States, to the latter 

 granted them under their Treaty with Great Britain in the year 1818. 

 England could not and would not have granted to the United States 

 that which she had no right to grant, and much less would she 

 deprive the inhabitants of the soil of rights she had granted to non- 

 residents and to aliens. 6 



1877: The British case before the Halifax Commission (1877) 

 asserted that Americans prosecuted the herring fishery at Bonne Bay 

 and Bay of Islands on the western coast, and stated further: 



It may possibly be contended on the part of the United States that 

 their fishermen have not in the past availed themselves of the New- 

 foundland inshore fisheries, with but few exceptions, and that they 

 would and do resort to the coasts of that island only for the purpose 

 of procuring bait for the Bank fishery. This may up to the present 



U. S. Counter Case, Appendix, 229. 6 U. S. Counter Case, Appendix, 277-278. 



