APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 585 
If the present ‘‘ Projet” is agreeable to Russia, we are ready to conclude and sign 
the Treaty. If the territorial arrangements are not satisfactory, we are ready to 
postpone them, and to conclude and sign the essential part—that which relates to 
navigation alone, adding an Article stipulating to negotiate about territorial limits 
hereafter. 
But we are not prepared to defer any longer the settlement of that essential part 
of the question; and if Russia will neither sign the whole Convention nor that essen- 
tial part of it, she must not take it amiss that we resort to some mode of recording, 
in the face of the world, our protest against the pretensions of the Ukase of 1821, 
and of effectually securing our own interests against the possibility of its future 
operations. 
[Inclosure 16 in No. 382.] 
Mr. S. Canning to Mr. G. Canning. 
ST. PETERSBURGH, February 17 (March 1), 1825. 
Sir: By the messenger Latchford I have the honour to send you the accompany- 
ing Convention between His Majesty and the Emperor of Russia respecting the 
Pacific Ocean and north-west coast of America, which, according to your instruc- 
tions, I concluded and signed last night with the Russian Plenipotentiaries. 
The alterations which, at their instance, I have admitted into the ‘‘ Projet,” such 
as I presented it to them at first, will be found, I conceive, to be in strict conformity 
with the spirit and substance of His Majesty’s commands. The order of the two 
main subjects of our negotiation, as stated in the preamble of the Convention, is 
preserved in the Articles of that instrument. The line of demarcation along the 
strip of land on the north-west coast of America, assigned to Russia, is laid down in 
the Convention agreeably to your directions, notwithstanding some difficulties raised 
on this point, as well as on that which regards the order of the Articles, by the Rus- 
sian Plenipotentiaries. 
The instance in which you will perceive that I have most availed myself of the 
latitude afforded by your instructions to bring the negotiation to a satisfactory and 
prompt conclusion is the division of the IlIrd Article of the new “ Projet,” as it 
stood when I gave it in, into the IlIrd, 1Vth, ane Vth Articles of the Convention 
signed by the Plenipotentiaries. 
This change was suggested by the Russian Plenipotentiaries, and at first it was 
suggested in a shape which appeared to me objectionable; but the Articles, as they 
are now drawn up, I humbly conceive to be such as will not meet with your disap- 
probation. The second paragraph of the 1Vth Article had already appeared paren- 
thetically in the IlIrd Article of the “ Projet,” and the whole of the IVth Article is 
limited in its signification and connected with the Article immediately preceding it 
by the first paragraph. ; 
With respect to Behring’s Straits, I am happy to have it in my power to assure 
you, on the joint authority of the Russian Plenipotentiaries, that the Emperor of 
Russia has no intention whatever of maintaining any exclusive claim to the naviga- 
tion of those straits, or of the seas to the north of them. 
It cannot be necessary, under these circumstances, to trouble you with a more 
particular account of the several conferences which I have held with the Russian 
Plenipotentiaries, and it is but justice to state that I have found them disposed, 
throughout this latter stage of the negotiation, to treat the matters under discussion 
with fairness and liberality. 
As two originals of the Convention prepared for His Majesty’s Government are 
signed by the Plenipotentiaries, I propose to leave one of them with Mr. Ward for 
the archives of the Embassy. 
I have, &c. 
(Signed) STRATFORD CANNING. 
