212 THE TREATY OF WASHINGTON. 
Spain and the United States of Eebruary 22, 1819, 
by which the former ceded to the latter the two 
Floridas, carrying our territory down to the Gulf of 
Mexico, and by which also a line of demarkation was 
run between the territories of the respective Parties 
west of the Mississippi. This line, commencing on 
the Gulf of Mexico at the mouth of the River Sabine; 
proceeds by that river, the Red River, and the Arkan- 
sas, to its source in latitude 42° north; “and thence 
by that parallel of latitude to the South Sea.” And 
Spain expressly ceded to the United States all her 
“rights, claims, and pretensions to any territories east 
and north of the said line, as thus defined and de- 
scribed by the treaty.” To the rights, claims, and 
pretensions of the United States on the northwest 
coast we could now add those of Spain. 
But another pretender to rights on that coast now 
appeared in the person of Russia, whose actual occu- 
pation came down to the parallel of 54° 40’; and 
thereupon it was agreed between Russia and the 
United States by Treaty of April 17, 1824, that the 
latter would not permit any settlement by its citizens 
on the coast or islands north of that degree, and that 
no subjects of the former should be permitted to settle 
on- the coast or islands south of the same degree. 
Neither Government, however, undertook to make: 
any cession to the other. Nor was the country south 
of the line described as a territory or possession of 
the United States. 
During the next year, Russia and Great Britain 
concluded a treaty for the demarkation of the limits 
