CORRESPONDENCE 431 



plete statement for the twenty-two vessels which were in Fortune Bay on the 6th 

 January, 1878, and the Government of the United States sees no reason to doubt 

 the accuracy of these estimates. I find upon examining the testimony of one of the 

 most intelligent of the Newfoundland witnesses called before the HaUfax Commission 

 by the British Government, Judge Bennett, formerly Speaker of the Colonial House, 

 and himself largely interested in the business, that he estimates the Fortune Bay 

 business in frozen herring, in the former years of purchase, at 20,000 to 25,000 barrels 

 for the season and that it was increasing, and this is confirmed by others. 



The evidence in this case shows that the catch which the United States fishing 

 fleet had on this occasion actually reahzed was exceptionally large, and would have 

 supplied profitable cargoes for all of them. When to this is added the fact that the 

 whole winter was lost, and these vessels compelled to return home in ballast, that 

 this violence had such an effect upon this special fishery, that in the winter of 1878- 

 79 it has been almost entirely abandoned, and the former fleet of twenty-six 

 vessels ha^ been reduced to eight, none of whom went provided with seines, but 

 were compelled to purchase their fish of the inhabitants of Newfoundland, the United 

 States Government is of opinioin that $105,305.02 may be presented as an estimate 

 of the loss as claimed, and you will consider that amount as being what this Gov- 

 ernment will regard as adequate compensation for loss and damage. 



In conclusion, I would not be doing justice to the wishes and opinions of the 

 United States Government if I did not express its profound regret at the apparent 

 conflict of interests which the exercise of its treaty privileges appears to have de- 

 veloped. There is no intention on the part of this Government that these privileges 

 should be abused, and no desire that their full and free enjoyment should harm the 

 Colonial fishermen. While the differing interests and methods of the shore fishery 

 and the vessel fishery make it impossible that the regulation of the one should be 

 entirely given to the other, yet if the mutual obligations of the treaty of 187 1 are to 

 be maintained, the United States Government would gladly cooperate with the Govern- 

 ment of Her Britannic Majesty in any effort to make those regulations a matter of 

 reciprocal convenience and right; a means of preserving the fisheries at their highest 

 point of production, and of conciliating a community of interest by a just proportion 

 of advantages and profits. 



I am, Sir, 



Your obedient servant, 

 (Signed) Wm. M. Evaets 



NOTE FROM LORD SALISBURY TO MR. HOPPIN, AMERICAN CHARGE 

 AT LONDON, APRIL 3, 1880 » 



Foreign Oitice, April 3, 1880 

 Sir, — In the note which I had the honour to address to you on the 12th February 

 last I explained the reason why a certain time has unavoidably elapsed before Her 

 Majesty's Government were in a position to reply to Mr. Welsh's notes of the 13th 

 August last, in which he preferred, on the part of your Government, a claim for 105,305 

 dols. 2 c. as compensation to some United States' fishermen on account of losses stated 

 to have been sustained by them through certain occurrences which took place at 

 Fortune Bay, Newfoundland, on the 6th January, 1878. The delay which has arisen 

 has been occasioned by the necessity of instituting a very careful inquiry into the cir- 



' Appendix, British Case, p. 278; Appendix, U. S. Case, p. 683. 



