1789.] CONDUCT OF THE AMERICANS AT NOOTKA. 199 



and the only evidence, with regard to those events, except the 

 journal of Douglas, which can bear the test of strict examination, is 

 contained in a letter addressed, three years afterwards, to the 

 Spanish commandant of Nootka, by Gray, the captain of the 

 Washington, and Ingraham, the mate of the Columbia.* Meares 

 and Colnett endeavor to cast blame on the Americans for their 

 conduct in these proceedings ; their complaints, however, on exam- 

 ination, seem to rest entirely on the fact that the Washington and 

 Columbia were undisturbed, while their own vessels were seized by 

 the Spaniards. That Gray and Kendrick profited by the quarrels 

 between the other two parties is probable, and no one can question 

 their right to do so ; but no evidence has been adduced that they, on 

 any occasion, took an unfair advantage of either : though it is also 

 probable that their feelings were rather in favor of the Spaniards, 

 by whom they were always treated with courtesy and kindness, 

 than of the British, to whom, if we are to judge by the expressions 

 of Meares and Colnett, they were, from the commencement, the 

 objects of hatred and ridicule. 



In one of the above-mentioned trading excursions of the Wash- 

 ington, made in June, 1789, Gray explored the whole east coast of 

 Queen Charlotte's Island, which had never before been visited by 

 the people of any civilized nation, though Duncan, in the Princess 

 Royal, had, in the preceding year, sailed through the sea separating 

 it from the main land and other islands. The American, being 

 ignorant of this fact, as also of the name bestowed on the territory 

 by Dixon, called it Washington's Island; and thus it was, for a 

 long period, always distinguished by the fur traders of the United 

 States. Meares endeavors, in his narrative, to secure to Douglas, 

 the captain of the Iphigenia, the merit of having first established 

 the insulation of the territory ; though Douglas, in his journal 

 annexed to that narrative, expressly alludes to the previous visits 

 of the Washington to many places on the east coast. The assertion 

 of this claim for Douglas was one of the causes of the dispute 

 between Meares and Dixon, in 1791, which will be hereafter men- 

 tioned more particularly. 



In a subsequent excursion from Nootka, Gray entered the opening- 

 south-east of that place, between the 48th and 49th parallels of 

 latitude, which had been found by Berkely in 1787, and was sup- 

 posed to be the mouth of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Through 



* See Proofs and Illustrations, under the letter D. 



