1790.] NOOTKA CONVENTION BEFORE PARLIAMENT. 213 



in the debates in Parliament on that message, or in the official 

 correspondence between the two governments on the subject, so far 

 as published ; and the only evidence of such acquisition of lands or 

 erection of buildings to be found among the documents annexed to 

 the Memorial presented by Meares to the ministry, is contained in 

 the information of William Graham, a seaman of the Felice, which 

 was taken in London five days after the date of the Memorial. 

 " The statement of actual and probable losses,^ for which the memo- 

 rialists prayed to be indemnified, to the amount of six hundred and 

 fifty thousand dollars, is, moreover, confined entirely to losses con- 

 sequent upon the seizure of the vessels and cargoes at Nootka. 

 This silence, with regard to lands and buildings, in all the docu- 

 ments brought from China by Meares, certainly authorizes the 

 suspicion that the idea of advancing a claim on those points may 

 have occurred to that gentleman, or may have been suggested 

 to him after his arrival in England, and even after his first commu- 

 nications with the ministers. 



With respect to the rights of navigation and fishery in the Pacific 

 and Southern Oceans, and of settlement on their unoccupied coasts, 

 it was insisted by Fox, Grey, the marquis of Lansdowne, and other 

 eminent members of the opposition in Parliament, that nothing 

 had been gained, but, on the contrary, much had been surrendered, 

 by the convention. " Our right, before the convention," said Mr. Fox, 

 — " whether admitted or denied by Spain was of no consequence, — 

 was to settle in any part of South or North-West America, not for- 

 tified against us by previous occupancy ; and we were now restrict- 

 ed to settle in certain places only, and under certain conditions. 

 Our rights of fishing extended to the whole ocean ; and now it was 

 limited, and not to be exercised within certain distances of the 

 Spanish settlements. Our right of making settlements was not, as 

 now, a right to build huts, but to plant colonies, if we thought 

 proper. In renouncing all right to make settlements in South 

 America, we had given to Spain what she considered as inestima- 

 ble, and had, in return, been contented with dross." " In every 

 place in which we might settle," said Grey, " access was left for the 

 Spaniards. Where we might form a settlement on one hill, they 

 might erect a fort on another ; and a merchant must run all the 

 risks of a discovery, and all the expenses of an establishment, for a 

 property which was liable to be the subject of continual dispute, 

 and could never be placed upon a permanent footing." 



