I9I3.] OF THE UNITED STATES. 237 



for any political object, but for a purely commercial purpose, in 

 which all the navigating nations of the world have a common 

 interest." 



" The ultimate object is to secure to all nations the free and equal right 

 of passage over the isthmus. If the United States should first become a 

 party to this guaranty, it cannot be doubted that similar guarantees will be 

 given to New Granada by Great Britain and France." 



If the proposition should be rejected by the Senate, the President 

 said, " we may deprive the United States of the just influence which 

 its acceptance might secure to them, and confer the glory and benefits 

 of being the first among the nations in concluding such an arrange- 

 ment upon the government either of Great Britain or France." 



But, at the time that this treaty was made, Great Britain claimed 

 dominion in certain parts of Central America over which she exerted 

 authority and of which she was in actual possession ; these were the 

 territory extending along the coast of 'Guatemala, called Belize or 

 British Honduras, including an island called Ruatan and other Bay 

 Islands, and she asserted a protectorate over a long stretch of Nica- 

 raugua inhabited by the Mosquito Indians, called the Mosquito 

 Coast. She had a more direct claim upon and closer personal rela- 

 tion with the people of Central America than we had, — her occupa- 

 tion of British Honduras dating back at least to a treaty which she 

 made with Spain in 1786. 



In pursuance of our policy, however, of creating a neutral terri- 

 tory at the isthmus, and of preventing the establishment there by 

 any single foreign nation of exclusive control, we prop6sed, in 1850, 

 that Great Britain should unite her interests with ours in order that 

 not only the canal should be built upon fair and equitable terms, 

 " but that its construction should inure to the benefit of all nations 

 and should offer equal opportunity to the commerce of the world ; 

 and for this purpose we invited Great Britain, and she consented, to 

 enter into a convention with us with the intention of setting forth 

 and fixing the views and intentions of both governments, with refer- 

 ence to any means of communication by ship canal which may be 

 constructed between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans by way of the 

 river San Juan de Nicaragua, to any port or place on the Pacific 



