APPENDIX TO COUNTER-CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 381 



of eight, consistiDg in the whole of 20 families and 462 individuals." 

 But, more thau twenty years since, Heurieuhad shown, in his introduc- 

 tion to the voyage of Marchaud, that in this statement there was a mis- 

 take of at least 10 degrees of latitude, and that, instead of 48° and 49°, it 

 should read 5S° and 59°. This is probably not the only mistake in the 

 account. It rests altogether upon the credit of two private letters — 

 one written from San Bias, and tlie other from the city of Mexico, to 

 Spain — there communicated to a French Consul in one of the Spanish 

 ports, and by him to the French Minister of Marine. They were writ- 

 ten in October 1788 and August 1789. We have seen that in 1790 

 Kussia explicitly disclaimed interfering with the exclnsive rights of 

 Spain to beyond Prince William's Sound in latitude 61°; and Van- 

 couver, in 1794, was informed by the Eussians on the spot that their 

 most eastern Settlement there was on Hitchinbrook Island, at Port 

 Etches, Avhich liad been established in the course of the preceding sum- 

 mer^ and that the adjacent continent was a sterile and uninhabited 

 country. 



Until the Nootka Sound contest Great Britain had never advanced 

 any claim to territory upon tlie north-west coast of America by righ;^ 

 of occui)ation. Under the treaty of 1763 her territorial rights were 

 bounded by the Mississipj)i. 



On the -!2nd July, 1793, McKenzie reached the shores of the Pacific 

 by laud from Canada in latitude 52° 21' north, longitude 128° 2' west 

 of Greenwich. 



It is stated in the 52nd number of the "Quarterly Eeview," in the 

 article upon Kotzebue's voyage, "that the whole country, from latitude 

 56° 30' to the boundary of the United States in latitude 48°, or there- 

 abouts, is now and has long been in the actual possession of the Brit- 

 ish North- we.st Company;" that this Company have a post on the 

 borders of a river in latitude 54° 30' north, longitude 125° west, and 

 that, in latitude 55° 15' north, longitude 129° 44' west, "by this time 

 (March 182i;) the United Company of the North west and Hudson's 

 Bay have, in all probability, formed an establishment." 



It is not imaginable tliat, in the present condition of the world, any 

 European nation should entertain the project of settling a Colony on 

 the northwest coast of America. That the United States should form 

 establishments there, with views of absolute territorial riglit and inland 

 communication, is not only to be expected, but is pointed out by the 

 finger of Nature, and has been for many ypars a subject of serious 

 deliberation in Congress. A plan has for several Sessions been before 

 them for establishing a Territorial Government on the borders of the 

 Columbia Kiver. It will undoubtedly be resumed at their next Session, 

 and even if then again postponed there cannot be a doubt that, in the 

 course of a very few years, it must be carried into effect. 



As yet, however, the only useful purpose to which the north-west 

 coast of America has been or can be made subservient to the Settle- 

 ments of civilized men are the fisheries on its adjoining seas and trade 

 with the aboriginal inhabitants of the country. These have hitherto 

 been enjoyed in common by the people of the United States, and by the 

 British and Eussian nations. The Spanish, Portuguese, and French 

 nations have also participated in them hitherto, without other annoy- 

 ance than that which resulted from the exclusive territorial claims of 

 Spain, so long as they were insisted on by her. 



The United States and Great Britain have both protested against 

 the Eussian Imperial Ukase of the 4th (10th) September, 1821. At 

 the proposal of the Eussian Government, a full power and instructions 



