598 APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
Now, therefore, I, Benjamin Harrison, President of the United States, pursuant to 
the above-recited Statutes, hereby warn all persons against entering the waters of 
Behring’s Sea within the dominion of the United States for the purpose of violating 
the provisions of the said Section 1956, Revised Statutes; and I hereby proclaim 
that all persons found to be or have been engaged in any violation of the Laws of 
the United States in said waters will be arrested and punished as above provided, 
and that all vessels so employed, their tackle, apparel, furniture, and cargoes, will 
be seized and forfeited. 
In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the 
United States to be affixed. 
8 Done in the city of Washington this 15th day of March, 1890, and of the 
Independence of the United States the 114th. 
(Signed) BENJN. HARRISON. 
By the President: 
(Signed) JAMES G. BLAINE, 
Secretary of State. 
Sir J. Pauncefote to the Marquis of Salisbury.—( Received September 1.) 
[Extract ]} 
MAGNOLIA, July 24, 1890. 
The adjournment of the Behring’s Sea negotiations caused by the 
departure of the Secretary of State from Washington for Bar Harbour, 
as reported in my telegram of the 3rd instant,* affords a convenient 
opportunity for submitting to your Lordship some observations on the 
course of those negotiations and on the present situation of the con- 
troversy. 
It may be convenient, in the first place, to recall the circumstances 
under which the London negotiation was renewed in Washington. 
The London negotiation had been interrupted by various events 
before any satisfactory inquiry had taken place into those important 
questions of fact on which the United States Government base their 
contention that a close season in Behring’s Sea is indispensable for the 
preservation of the fur-seal species. That contention was supported, 
no doubt, by a considerable amount of ex parte evidence, on the 
strength of which the United States Government proposed a close 
season from the 15th April to the 1st November. 
At the same time they declared that they only desired a close season 
for such a period as might be requisite for the end in view. 
Her Majesty’s Government were disposed to entertain the proposal 
favourably, subject to the views of the Canadian Government, as repre- 
senting that part of Her Majesty’s dominions immediately interested 
in the seal fishery. The Canadian Government pointed out that the 
proposal of the United States Government would practically have the 
effect of excluding Canadian sealers altogether from Behring’s Sea: 
That the period suggested for a close season might as well be read from 
the Ist January to the 3ist December, it being notorious that seals do 
not enter Bebring’s Sea until the middle or end of May, and have left 
those waters by the end of October. They disputed the accuracy and 
value of the evidence relied on by the United States Government. 
It was at this juncture that Mr. Phelps, the United States Minister 
i London (according to Mr. Blaine’s note of the 19th July, 1890), tele- 
* See ‘‘ United States No. 2 (1890),” p. 506. 
