THE 



National Geographic Magazine 



Vol. X NOVEMBER, 1899 No. 11 



THE ALASKAN BOUNDARY 



By Hon. John W. Foster, 



Ex-Secretary of State 



In the letter of the President of the Geographic Society inviting 

 me to prepare a paper for The National Geographic Magazine, 

 he expressed a desire that I should discuss the Alaskan bound- 

 ary, because it was a subject that most deeply concerns our people 

 and the paper would be a timely contribution toward its proper 

 consideration. In accepting the invitation, I feel that I must 

 confine my presentation of the topic to the facts accessible to any 

 student of the events of the period and avoid all reference to 

 pending negotiations. 



Happily, however, the material at hand for an accurate un- 

 derstanding of the subject is abundant and within reach of the 

 inquirer. Its history had its inception three-quarters of a cen- 

 tury ago ; yet few negotiations among nations of such a date 

 are accompanied by so great a mass of concurrent documents 

 and facts to explain the motives and objects had in view by the 

 interested parties, and to make apparent the understanding of 

 these parties as to the effect of the negotiations after their con- 

 clusion. The Alaskan boundary is fixed by the treat}' of 1825 

 between Russia and Great Britain, and every step of the anterior 

 oegotiationa was carefully recorded at the time, and the seventy 

 or more years following the celebration of the treaty are marked 

 by repeated acts of the contracting parties and those claiming 

 under them, explaining their interpretation of that instrument. 



The treaty of 1825 grew out of the issuance by the Emperor 

 of Russia of an imperial ukase in 1821, the purport of which, 



